Iconic American Women: From Hollywood to the White House featuring Kate Andersen Brower

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Hey everybody, Jaci Clement here, and today's topic is iconic American women, and I can't think of a better person to discuss that with Kate Anderson Brower. Kate, so much for— thanks so much for joining us today.

Thanks so much for having me.

You know, I want to talk so much to you about the particular ladies that you've looked at from the White House to Hollywood. But first, I'm a little interested in how you went down this path of how you changed from journalism into becoming an author and really diving into the women in particular that you're interested in.

Yeah, I, I've always thought that women had very, you know, multifaceted stories as, you know, mothers and wives and also just struggling to kind of balance everything. So I've always been fascinated by women's stories. And then I was a reporter at Bloomberg News in Washington when President Obama was in office for his first term. And so I wrote a book called The Residence about the White House staff. And I came up with that idea after being invited to a lunch with Michelle Obama. And there was a server walking in and out, and she clearly knew him. And I thought, like, what is going on here? This world of people who we never get to see. And so I transitioned after having our first child into writing and reporting and working for myself, essentially, which has been a challenge, but I wouldn't trade it for anything.

Yeah, that's a lot to juggle. It is. So you started with the White House and the women there, but most recently now you came out with a book on Elizabeth Taylor. So I think that's kind of an interesting jump, but there must be some similarities as well as some big differences is what I'm guessing. So tell me a little bit about that.

Yeah, I mean, that book came to be through a friendship that I developed with Senator John Warner, who was a Virginia Republican. I got to know him in his 90s. You know, he wanted people to remember Elizabeth, and I thought it could make a very fun, you know, magazine piece. I was especially interested in her years as an activist. And to me, she reminded me a little bit of Betty Ford and other really impactful first ladies in terms of being culturally significant, iconic woman. She was the first celebrity entrepreneur, the first celeb— major celebrity HIV and AIDS activist. I mean, what she did was incredible. And so Senator Warner put me in touch with her children and the trustees of her estate who said, you know what, now's the time for a definitive biography of her life. We will give you diaries and access to letters. And that, you know, as a journalist, I couldn't pass that up. It was incredible getting inside her head and kind of trying to figure out what Yeah.

So how would you describe that exactly? Like, what would we be surprised to learn about her in particular?

You know, I think she was more vulnerable than I thought at first. You know, she— being a child star, there's such a tremendous amount of stress and pressure that is put on these young stars, and then and now. I mean, there's a book out, I'm Glad My Mom Died, you know, written by this former child actress that's all about being a child star and those expectations and what that does to your relationships with the most important people in your life, which is your family. And so for Elizabeth, it was always about trying to please her mother. It was never good enough, you know? And her later drug addiction, I think, really started at MGM. You know, they give kids uppers and downers so that they could shoot, you know? But then I think also it's just her tremendous writing ability. I mean, she's a great writer, so I loved reading her love letters to Richard Burton and, you know, her different husbands. She was married 8 times to 7 men, and that's what she's probably most famous for, but there was a lot more to her than that.

Yeah. Anything surprising in those letters?

Yeah, I mean, I think— well, I was surprised that she had been abused by her father. I was surprised that she loved Richard Burton, it seems, more than he loved her. I mean, a lot of the letters are— because I was reading letters he wrote to her too, and she was just desperate to kind of keep him happy and to stay together. And he was often apologizing for whatever he had done the night before, you know, in terms of arguments. But there's also a lot of light and passion between them too. It's just a very fiery relationship that kind of exploded— imploded, really. But I I was just impressed that she— I think she always thought she needed a man. And in the end, her most important definitive years were when she was single, which was in the '80s when she started Passion and White Diamonds. You know, I grew up with the commercials. And she made so much money. And she gave a lot of that money to HIV and AIDS. So I don't know. I'd be so curious if I'd ever gotten a chance to meet her, if she kind of— had that realization too, you know, that she was her most impactful when she was single.

Yeah. Do you, do you think she ever felt like she really made it?

I don't think she cared. I really don't. She said it's, you know, she'd rather be a good woman than a great actress. I don't think that— I think she was someone who was very sure of herself. She's the first, first actor, male or female, to get paid $1 million for a film, and she demanded that for Cleopatra. So I think she always knew her value. in a really modern way. She would walk away from deals if she didn't think she was getting what she deserved. And I think that's a lesson that all women can learn.

Oh, absolutely. And it's surprising to learn it. It's also surprising that they wrote letters because that just seems so, you know, you just don't think about doing that these days. But it's very romantic.

It is. I mean, that was the only— I mean, they would write to each other when they were even staying in the same hotel and they would leave letters on the for each other. It's really sweet. And now everything's, of course, email, which is decidedly less romantic.

Yes.

And, you know, she wasn't— I guess I also— I mean, there were so many surprising things, but another thing was that I always thought she was a bit superficial about the jewelry. And she just amassed a huge collection, more than $150 million worth of jewelry. It was sold off at a Christie's auction, the largest private jewelry collection in the world. But it meant a lot to her because it told the story of her life, and she kept each piece in a box with the name of the husband who gave it to her. And I just love that because she, she would— it was really sentimental, and even cheap pieces she loved as much as the expensive ones.

Where do you think her business acumen came from?

I think her mom was a shrewd business person because her mom pushed her into acting, and they, oh, they were social climbers, you know. Her parents were always Looking, especially her mom, looking at ways to stay connected. So I think it was through her mom, and I think a lot of it was just innate within herself. Okay. All right.

Do you see any similarities between her and some of the First Ladies, either in character or perhaps they were misrepresented in some way from how they really were?

I think all the First Ladies are misrepresented and misunderstood. Yeah, I think Melania Trump included, you know. I think people think of her as kind of a— well, she's definitely a cipher and really difficult to figure out. But I think that she's smarter than people think. And, you know, Michelle Obama was misunderstood. I mean, you name it, nobody really knows who they are. So I think every single one— there's a comparison there. But I— the most obvious one to me is Betty Ford because of the Betty Ford Center. Elizabeth was the first celebrity to talk about going to the Betty Ford Center. And the way that both of them tried to reduce the stigma attached to, you know, drug and alcohol addiction, you know, made them both trailblazers that I think, you know, Betty Ford's husband said, you know, when history is written, my wife will be remembered as a more important figure than I am. And I think that's true, and that's incredible that he could say that.

It is. It really is. Now, do you have kind of a shorthand for how you would describe each of the First Ladies?

No, I mean, you mean like one adjective to describe each of them?

Yeah, I'm wondering how they're similar or different just in personalities.

I mean, I don't have a sure— I think they're all complicated and they're intelligent and they— so, I mean, and I think the way that we see them in the press is different from, like, for instance, Rosalynn Carter, who I'm thinking a lot about now, you know, was known as the Steel Magnolia, you know, and she said, what's wrong with that? Steel is strong and magnolias are beautiful and Southern.

Yeah.

But she was also somebody who could be deeply hurt. I mean, when I interviewed her and she talked in 2018 about her husband's election loss in 1980, and it was as though it had happened yesterday, you know, it's— the wounds are very fresh. And I think that first ladies take it a lot more personally sometimes.

Yeah. Is there a way that the modern first lady has sort of evolved from the, you know, who would be the older first ladies that you compare to, say Betty Ford or back then versus Michelle Obama?

Yeah, I mean, in some ways we've gone backwards and, you know, it's like 2 steps forward and 1 step back because you have someone like Eleanor Roosevelt who is just such a powerful first lady, the first first lady to testify before Congress, you know, a real political partner to her husband. And then you have someone like Melania Trump who moves into the White House months after she's supposed to and is clearly not interested in becoming a political figure at all. But then, you know, on the bright side, you have Jill Biden who's working. And I think that the fact that she's still teaching is really important. And hopefully that will become a trend for other first ladies because she's been able to do it. Although if you're a lawyer or a writer or anything outside, even a doctor, I mean, it just becomes more complicated. It's almost like a teacher is one of the only things you really could do, maybe an interior decorator or something in the arts. But I think at least it's kind of ripping off the Band-Aid and hopefully helping people feel Okay with a First Lady who's pursuing her, you know, career and also being at the same time that she's First Lady.

Yeah, because I think the general perception is, you know, well, one, if you're the First Lady, you don't need to work, but that's different than wanting to work and to have your own identity. So I realized for the ones that married politicians, they sort of understood what they were signing up for. But were any of them actually prepared for the White House?

I think Nancy Reagan was incredibly prepared for the White House. You know, she was waiting. She put First Lady on her income taxes, you know, as her job description. It was— she was ready for it. And I think she's the one that really stands out to me. I think Hillary Clinton was surprised by the backlash. You know, she She was ahead of her time in a lot of ways, and she thought she could be a political partner to her husband. And clearly the midterm elections showed that that wasn't what the American people were ready for, and healthcare reform failed. And in my reporting, I discovered that she really wanted to not have the West Wing office anymore. And that she really regretted that decision. But, you know, Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner had offices in the West Wing. So I think maybe we've moved forward on that as well.

Okay. Do you think there are any expectations for what the next First Lady either should be or shouldn't be?

I mean, how ingrained is this in the American psyche of what the First Lady I mean, I think, you know, the first ladies I interviewed were very clear in that they discovered that no matter what they did, there were going to be critics. You know, Michelle Obama's Let's Move campaign, very innocuous to try to reduce childhood obesity, right?

Mm-hmm.

And in the press, it was seen as she was trying to be the food police and stop people from enjoying life. And it was just kind of spun in this strange way. And so I think no matter what you do, you're going to be called out for it. So I hope that we are, you know, the next First Lady, whoever that is, will be able to behave in a way that is true to herself and not feel like she's trying to fulfill expectations because there's nothing in the Constitution that tells you what to do as First Lady. There's no job description. There's no pay. And yet we expect so much from them, and we expect them to have a campaign that's somehow influential but also not controversial. And there's really very few things that are— that fit that bill. I mean, Lady Bird Johnson did highway beautification and trying to plant more flowers, and, you know, that's a noble cause. But anything in the space of, you know, I'm thinking of gun control or anything like that. It's just so political. It's very difficult to be First Lady. It's a really tough job.

And I would think with social media now, it's nearly impossible.

Yeah, I mean, I think it's wise for them not to really look or engage much on that. And, you know, I think Michelle Obama was really stung by— I know she was— and, you know, by all of the negativity. And a lot of it was racially, you know, was racist, frankly. And so yeah, I think they have to rise above a lot.

Wow.

And that's incredibly hard when all you're surrounded by is critics all the time. So tell me a little bit about Jackie Kennedy. Any revelations there? I ask, I was actually named after her when I was not a boy as my parents expected me to be.

Oh, that's great. I love the name. Is your name Jacqueline fully?

Yeah.

I love it. She was, you know, at the beginning, she was seen as a kind of a detrimental, like, part of the campaign that, you know, she didn't look like a lot of other women. She had the really short hair, and she wore expensive clothes. And And people in Jack Kennedy's campaign thought that that wouldn't go over well. And then suddenly it became clear that she was the most, you know, women all over the country were trying to look like Jackie Kennedy, right? Just so elegant. And so I think that she surprised herself when she became First Lady in her power. And she did so much to restore the White House. House. She created the White House Historical Association, and through that she was able to get these incredible pieces of furniture that were lost to the ages, you know. She wanted the house to be the most beautiful home in the country and that American children could see this, rich or poor. So in a way, I think it was kind of egalitarian of her. You know, you don't think of her that way. I think of her as— a little snobby, really, frankly. But I think she had a pureness to her too, right? Like, she just wanted kids from Appalachia, you know, to be able to see the White House, and that's why she did the televised tour of the White House for the first time, opening it up to people.

Okay. All right. Kind of wondering, as you segued from journalism into becoming a book author, Did that influence the way you started to look at people? Is it sort of a different view? Tell me about that.

Yeah, I mean, that's a really great question because I think it makes me look at people in a less— I felt as a reporter, I was also a lot younger, that I was easily kind of intimidated. And I, you know, I put the presidency and First Ladies on this pedestal. And I think as an author, I try to look at them as human beings like anyone else, you know, and that— and to humanize them. And when you talk to them or you talk to people around them, you see that they really are just struggling with things as anyone else would. And it makes it so much more interesting when I think we tend to put presidents on this Strangely, in this country, we, you know, people criticize them a lot, but when you meet a president or you're in a room with them, you're just kind of absolutely— they're like, it's like meeting a king. And I think that's dangerous, and then we should look at them with their faults and their human— in all their humanity.

Yeah. Is there anything in your research that showed The first things they did after they left the White House? The reason I ask is I remember Michelle Obama giving some interview where she said one of the things she wanted to do was just roll down the car window and stick her head out.

Yeah.

Because you can't do that.

Yeah, that was a great— that was a great interview. I remember that. And then they went on vacation, she and her daughters and Obama. A lot of them just want to decompress for a while. And then you have people like the Carters who are completely stir-crazy. And, you know, he woke up in cold sweat one night and said, I know what I should do. I should open a center that we go and we do election monitoring around the world, and it'll be like what we did with the Camp David Peace Accords. And he just kept, I mean, kept going. And that's one of the reasons why they're so admired, because they just never stopped. And it wasn't about the money. I think a lot of former presidents, I'm thinking of Gerald Ford and Ronald Reagan, they're trying to accumulate money. Clinton, Obama, Bush less so, but I mean, he already has a lot of money. It just seems like a cash grab sometimes to me. It's like, how much is enough?

Right.

They get several hundred thousand dollars a year for themselves and their pension and the office, but then they get that much in a single speech, and it's like kind of amazing.

Yeah.

And a lot of it does go to charity, and a lot of it— you see what the Obamas are doing with their foundation, and they're opening a really interesting presidential library in Chicago and trying to make it so that— I like what they're doing, but a lot of historians are upset by it. The Obamas are putting most of the papers and the emails and everything online so that anybody can research it with an internet connection versus having to travel And so in a way that's opening up the information, but you have some historians who really want to sit there and feel the papers and, you know, the old school way. Yeah, research. And, you know, I'm curious what you think of that. I think opening it up is a good thing.

Well, to me it's in line with, you know, he embraced Google and he embraced the whole idea of the internet and the the information superhighway. So I could see that aspect of it. But there's also, you know, you look at it and then you have to take a step back and you say, all right, what are people going to do with this that's bad? You know?

Yeah.

And then there's the ability to lose control over it because it's just out there. So that would be my concern. But I think the more information you can get out there in general, And to give it to people because, yeah, who can travel to Chicago? You know, and why should they have to in these days? So there may be a way to present it that preserves the history and also safeguards that. But in general, I applaud that.

Yeah, yeah, I think it's great. There's also controversy, I think, about what they're deciding to put in it too. You know, how they're vetting the material. And I think every presidential library does that to an extent because you have to put in, you know, Freedom of Information requests all the time to get the stuff that's classified. It seems like the Obama Center is being sort of singled out, but I think that there are a lot of presidential libraries that just make them— it's kind of like a whitewashing of the presidency, right? And a museum to how wonderful the president was.

Yeah. Well, it is kind of interesting though when you think about it, because they go from being the most powerful couple in the world to the day after, you know, when they're no longer there. So it— I wonder what that does to the First Ladies in particular and their psyche as to, you know, who am I now?

I mean, it depends on the First Lady, but in many cases it seems like, um, stressful for someone like Lady Bird Johnson. She was worried about her husband because she knew that he really You know, his health would not be good if he didn't have anything to do, and he did die shortly after leaving office. But I think someone like Laura Bush, it's completely different. You know, he— W. Bush's temperament is one that he was okay with leaving. And I think it's really different if you're a one-term president and you feel like Trump, you know, and you feel like you were robbed of this opportunity, um, versus Obama, who had 2 terms and there was no way that, you know, or Clinton for instance, what were they gonna do next? You know, they're— but I think there's a restlessness that they all have after leaving the White House.

I would imagine, and I would think it would take some sort of reinvention of who their new persona would be. I know I've gone to events where former White House chefs now do, you know, private dinners for people, and they'll present to you whatever a White House dinner was and come out and give you the history. So it's like the White House chefs have figured out what their next gig is, you know. I don't know if every president or first lady figures that out.

Yeah, I mean, they all seem to write books and get paid a lot for those books, and in different— I found the first lady's memoirs to be so much more revealing than the president's. Yeah, there's so many. I mean, that goes for Obama, that goes for Laura Bush's— I think it's Spoken from the Heart. It's a good memoir. Nancy Reagan's is great. You know, they're just much more interesting than the presidents that usually just go through kind of— I think Bush's in particular, I think it's called Decision Points, and it was very dry. So— For some reason, they feel— it feels like the presidents are in this defensive crouch after they leave, trying to defend their positions.

Okay.

First ladies are just talking about what it was like to live in the White House and their experience there.

Yeah, that makes sense. So tell me though, we get a lot of authors and, you know, we talk to a lot of people that are doing different types of books. So I know, you know, being a book author has changed a lot. The industry has changed a lot. But you're actually dealing with topics where everyone knows your topics. They know the names of the people you're dealing with. Does that make it any easier when it comes to selling books these days or not?

I haven't ever done one where they don't know. I think it is much easier. The only book I've written that was really tricky was called First in Line, and it was about the vice presidency. And vice presidents are still not a sexy topic no matter what you do. So that was really hard to sell. And I think people— it's interesting. I think as a woman, sometimes, you know, I've interviewed presidents and written, you know, I interviewed Donald Trump and Jimmy Carter and I've done books about the presidency, but I always get asked about first ladies because I think the presidency is a really crowded space, and there's so many more people covering it. And so I think sometimes if you're kind of on the, you know, if you've found people who are interesting who are not covered that much, but who are still well known, I think Was there anything while you were researching your books that people told you was just off limits, or were they all very forthcoming? Oh yeah. I mean, there were a lot of things that, you know, I remember with Al Gore, I asked about what it was like to work in a White House with the most powerful First Lady in American history. And he said, I think our conversation is going to be shorter than we had planned, because he was not going to go into that. still. And I— so I think politicians are so much harder because they are so guarded. I mean, that's no surprise to you, obviously. But I really loved working on The Residence because I was talking to housekeepers and former butlers and people like you, just normal people. And they weren't kind of— but even they said, you know, they would go to their grave with stories that they needed to keep private. It's always tricky.

It's amazing. So what's next for you now? Do you have any new project in the works, or—

I'm working on something, but it's really not developed enough to really do it. It's this sort of stage where you're kind of seeing if there's enough access to do a book, which is, you know, I just have to see if I can get enough reporting to make it work.

I see. Okay. Anything we should talk about that I didn't bring up?

You know, I think that, and I think we will see this soon unfortunately with Jimmy Carter, is that there is so much that former presidents can do as, you know, like just as iconic figures in the country, in the world. And I think what he's done with the Carter Center is so incredible, and I'm sure that we will be hearing a lot more about that. But it's also what Rosalynn Carter did by his side. And the fact that people still mispronounce her name really bothers her. It's Rosalynn, but everyone says Rosalynn, including me when I first met her. And so it's really crazy to think that we don't even know how to pronounce the First Lady's name, and that kind of says a lot about you know, when you're a one-term president or first lady, how you're treated. Um, and so hopefully, uh, you know, there will be a newfound, you know, respect and interest in what they've accomplished.

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