Drugs, Dames & Laughs: Robin Gerber on Powerful Women, Caregiving, and Comedy

So she grabs this doll in this toy shop, says to her head of research and design, copy this doll.That really is where Barbie came from.

Barbie comes from a German whore.

From a German whore.She was actually the doll in Germany.

Oh, no.Welcome to Phil and Ted's Sexy Boomer Show.I'm Ted Bonnitt.

I'm Phil Proctor.Hi,.

Phil, you're here.

I'm actually here.And fresh off of a blues cruise.

I can smell the fish.

And while we were on the ship, the election happened and suddenly there was a blue tsunami and it lifted the ship and all of our spirits at the same time.

Yeah.

So it was.You could actually appreciably feel in the 1500 people that were there on the ship, you could feel a change in the atmosphere from anxious to elation.

It's a new era.

And we have an interesting show for you today.

Our guest, Robin Gerber has been a Washington lawyer, a Capitol Hill staffer, a labor lobbyist, a bestselling author, a historian, and is now a playwright.She wrote Leadership the Eleanor Roosevelt Way, biographies of Katharine Graham and Ruth Handler, who founded Barbie Mattel.She wrote a novel that puts Eleanor Roosevelt in the 1952 race against Ike.She's made the rounds in the History channel, biography channel, CNN's first ladies.She wrote a play called the Shot that starred Sharon Lawrence as Katherine Graham, which is an amazing.We're talking about that.What an amazing story that is.And her new one is the Best Medicine, a funny solo show about caring for a husband with Parkinson's, which is her own story, actually.And she took up stand up comedy class at age 72.

All right.She could still stand.

Yeah, she could still stand.Robyn Gerber is her name.Robin, welcome to the show.

Thanks so much.Thanks for having me.

You were a Washington operative in the early 80s, just when Reaganism was taking off.

That's true.But I was there for Clinton coming in and seeing the.Seeing those changes.So, yeah, it was a rocky time.Rocky time for labor.I worked for the labor movement for about 15 years.

Wow.

Wow.That was.Reagan was his first stain was blowing up the air traffic controllers union.

Yeah.

Right.So that was the beginning of the right to work and the breakup of the unions.

Yep.

Was that something on your agenda when you were back?You witnessed that?

I witnessed it and yeah, of course it was on our agenda.I was working for the building trades, which had completely different issues.But you can directly trace the rise of the middle class to the rise of the labor movement in the 30s and 40s.And you can also trace the decline of the middle class with the decline of the labor movement.But people will organize, as we saw.

If.

They get desperate enough, they will come together and they will fight back.Democracy was a big winner this week.

Very rewarding.Yes.

We've talked about this in the past here, about how in the early 60s, wealth creation in the middle class was outpacing the wealth creation of the wealth class.And that was intolerable.That had to end.And Reagan really represented that movement.Do you think that this blowout last Tuesday represents the last of the Reagan era?

I'm not so sure.I've been thinking about it since you said that.I'd have to think about that some more.I think it certainly marks the end of the Trump era.One thing we didn't see the mendacity with Reagan.We didn't see the denigration of the country.

That's right.

And of the Constitution and democracy.We were really facing the loss of the fundamentals that make America great.That actually make America great.And I found myself saying, and I heard a commentator say it this week, gosh, those old white guys back in 1776 were pretty damn smart.They created a system out of the looking at enlightenment ideas and others that really this.This election was really the celebration of our 250th.

Yeah.Affirmation.Reagan wasn't as overtly vicious as Trump.

I always thought of Reagan as being a swaggering cowboy from the movies.You know,.

I don't think he was trying to be an authoritarian.

Yeah,.

I really don't.

But he had the same kind of people working for him.Sdi, the Strategic Defense Initiative.That was loony.

That's right.

At the time.But he wasn't as overt as Trump.But then again, we didn't have social media.People kept it in their pants a little more back then.Right.And you worked for a legendary House leader.Congressional House leader.Who be that?

Nancy Pelosi.

Oh, wow.

There's committees and subcommittees.I was on a subcommittee for labor.That was my first job on the Hill when I was going to law school.So it wasn't like I worked directly with her.I worked with her chief of staff and then the head of the subcommittee.But, yep, I knew her back then.Let me just say, as long as we're talking about policy, one of the most important policies going forward right now is going to be helping people who are family caregivers.There are 63 million people like me who are living with people who need a lot of care.And there's absolutely no support for that.No one is.People are barely talking about it.You're starting to occasionally hear a lawmaker in state legislatures or on Capitol Hill mention the idea.Biden, to his credit in that first bill that he passed when he came in, had a provision for federal money for family caregivers, and Joe Manchin alone killed that.Isn't.

It nice that the Joe Manchins and the Fettermans of Congress are now irrelevant because of the sweep that we had?

That's.

Right.

Great feeling.

This goes to the heart of why you are on the show today.You described your youth as well spent involving drugs, sex and feminist activism and ended up being a Washington lawyer.You were in the fast lane.You had a very individualistic career and had a good time.And then what you talk about in your show, the Best Medicine, is how your world came to a halt because your husband was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease and suddenly the world flipped upside down.And this is what you're getting at, right?

Exactly.And in our case, we had very independent lives, very independent kind of marriage.He worked for people who had intellectual disabilities, but he worked at a very high level all over the country, helping states put supports in place for those people.I did my lobbying and then started writing books, as you said.I became a speaker on women's leadership that would speak to corporate women's groups.We literally would fly off in different directions on the same day.And I raised a couple of kids, but as I like to say, I raised them to leave.My third favorite child was my time and my freedom to do what I wanted to do.And I've been blessed being able to do that.I've had a really fun and great life.But then after, let's see, about 25 years of marriage, my husband got diagnosed with Parkinson's, and now he needs a lot more care.He's still around.People always ask me that at the end of the play.But suddenly I went from someone who could do what I wanted when I wanted to.I gotta learn about neurology and help them to doctor's appointments and all this kind of stuff.So it doesn't have to be Parkinson's.I.As I started to think about it, well, I'll tell you about the comedy class.What I noticed was that I'm a pretty upbeat.I'm a very upbeat person.And I was kind of losing that mojo because a serious disease is very difficult to deal with.

And.

I thought, gosh, you know, I don't want to lose my joy.And a friend mentioned that there was a comedy class, stand up comedy class in my little town.Right.And so I thought, heck, I'll do that.I can stand up and speak because I've been doing it for a long time.And when I took that class, the head of the.The teacher said, you have to talk about yourself.Tell me about you.And the minute I mentioned that I was a caregiver, but I really didn't, like, didn't fit my personality.He said, that's it.That is your.What your comedy routine has to be about.And in writing that routine and trying to find the funny in this crazy new situation, I did find my joy, I think.And Tony and I, that's my husband, became much closer.And I wanted to bring other people into it and open this up so that other people who are caregivers and feel isolated cannot feel so isolated.

What a wonderful story.

So Caroline Aaron, who most people will know from the Marvelous Ms. Maisel, does the one woman show, basically talking about your life.It wasn't your first marriage.Right.You met Tony later in life.

That's true.We both got.We both were married twice before we met each other.We were, as I say in the play, we were really good at getting married.It was that being married part that was the issue.But we've been married now 38 years, in fact, tomorrow.

Congratulations.The thing that struck me about the show was that you both were very dynamic, very independent.And then suddenly Tony gets ill and.

Dependency,.

And then he is stuck, and you took your vows, and now you have to live to your vows.And it was.

I didn't realize the warranty was so long.

What struck me was there was no more room to be selfish.You really had to become a selfless person.

I learned that when I was raising my daughter.

Yeah.

And we had split apart with my wife, and I realized I had to be the adult in the situation.I remember the very moment it happened.He was lying in the kitchen crying and throwing a tantrum.And I said, oh, okay.

Yeah,.

All right.

In a way, you had a surrender, an independence that you had lived by forever.As painful as it was as you write, it ultimately reveals itself as a blessing.

Yes, exactly.That's right.I think my.The way I put it is that my humanity was enlarged.That when you have children, young people ask me, should I have kids?You have to say, I don't know if you should have kids, because I can't tell you what it's like to have kids.For you, it's one of those experiences.Just have to experience.And I Think that's the same is true with.When we hit up against a really tough tragedy and we have to figure out how to live with that, are we going to sink under the weight of it or are we going to find a way, as I say in the play, to scrape together the broken fragments of what had been our life and remake something that can be joyous and fulfilling and a blessing, as you say.

How.

Did.

You arrive at that?Did you go through some back and forth?Was it painful?Oh,.

Sure.It was still painful.

Yeah.In the performance, your character decides to leave the marriage.What happened?

Yeah, that actually didn't happen.I put that in for dramatic effect.But here's what happened.A friend, an actress friend, said, you need more of a dramatic heart to the story.You should have her leave.And I said, I fantasize about that, but I've never done it.And then I started thinking about it.I thought, that's kind of out there.Do people really do that?So I researched it.And guess what the answer is.

Oh, yeah, they.

Sure.They.

Just run.

They.Absolutely.Even after 30 years of marriage, I heard all kinds of stories, found all kinds of stories like that.So the point is that people do make that choice, and I'm not going to judge them for it because it is very hard.And if.Maybe if you don't love the person the way I love Tony, that is something that you would do.But I felt the play needed to encompass the full range of feelings that people would have.But I do wanna emphasize.It's funny, right?

Oh, yeah.Oh, yeah.And Caroline Aaron is great.What a great choice.You went through a period of denial when it was first diagnosed or when the symptoms came on.You talk about that in the play as well.It wasn't like it was a light switch.One day you were told, this is it.

No.And other people I've talked to, in fact, Ed Begley Jr.Came to see the show and did the talk back the other day.

Oh, he's a great friend of ours.

His wife was saying they were at dinner, and he got a phone call.

From.

The doctor saying, we figured out what's wrong with you.You have Parkinson's.And she said, like, in the play, it was like this thunderbolt.And of course, we.I don't think anybody believes something like that is happening.Right.It's the process of accepting and moving forward.I think that the key.The play talks a lot about what is, accepting what is.And I think whether you have something like this happen or not, you better accept what is.Because we're all going to hopefully get old.

Tell me a little bit about your husband, Tony.What was he doing before he got the disease?

He, unlike me, who couldn't make up her mind what to do with her life, that hence my crazy resume.He did really one thing in his life, which was in his 20s.He started working for.For the ARC, which was then called the association for Retarded Citizens.

Oh,.

He started in D.C. he started placing people with intellectual disabilities in jobs and then he moved to closing institutions.The film Human H E U M A N n about the wonderful woman Judy Yuman, who founded, really built the movement for disability rights that happened in the 70s.He was part of that.He worked with her, in fact.And so he ended up working in 20 states closing institutions.These horrible asylums where people had been warehoused and moving them into the community and that.

Oh yeah,.

The.

Group homes.

So he was finding places for retarded people.Was he responsible for.

Trump's election people anymore?No,.

Of course not.People.

Have intellectual disability.

Challenged because I'm mentally challenged, too.

After those institutions shut down, as a journalist, I went to one of these homes.They were just homes in neighborhoods and they had six or eight people who had either down syndrome or some mental disability.And it was beautiful because they had some semblance of home life.They all had tasks and chores, and it was a much more normal situation.So is that what he was doing?

That's exactly what he was doing.

Oh, that was amazing.

I always said he did God's work.I just lobbied.

Getting back to Washington.Our guest Robin Gerber also wrote a play called the Shot, which is about the abuse in Kathryn Graham's marriage before she ran the Washington Post.What made you want to write about that part of her life?

I had written a biography of Katherine Graham called Katherine the Leadership Journey of an American Icon.And in writing that book, I felt like I mentioned the fact that she had been abused by her husband, but I didn't really think about how did she go from the abuse and then he kills himself and then she becomes publisher of the Washington Post.So I decided to write a play about that aspect of her life because no one had.

Her father ran the Washington Post, and when she got married, her father handed it over to her husband, his son in law.Not Katherine.

Exactly.And.

That didn't sit well, did it?

She was accepting of that because after all, that's what women did in the late 40s, 50s, that a man shouldn't be working for his wife.After all, what no one knew, I Think she really didn't understand was that Phil Graham was a very insecure guy with bipolar disorder, and he did abuse her.And I talked to.I knew David Gergen.We worked together when I was in Maryland, and he used to go out to dinner with her.David Gergen, the political consultant, used work for five presidents, and they used to go out to dinner once a month with other people.And he said one time I said to her, you know, what happened with Phil?And she wouldn't talk about it.But then he said to me, we all knew he was knocking her around.

Oh, wow.

Bruises and that kind of thing.But the.The real story there is how she overcame that and became publisher.He killed himself while they were alone in their country house.So she found him in the bathroom after the rifle shot went off.

Oh,.

He was a hunter, and he was very familiar with guns.So it was.Seemed to be the.

Natural.

Way.

Indeed.That's right.

Yeah.

And then three days later, she walked into the board and said, I'm not selling the paper.They all thought she'd sell it or let someone else run it.And she said, no, I'm going to run it.And so the play actually is very contemporary because it flashes back from the Watergate years, with her actually going through some of the very same things Trump has done, Nixon did to her.And in those scenes, she then flashes back to her time with Phil.So people are going to find it very recognizable.

Yeah.This is the biggest blowout since Nixon.

That's right.

This election cycle.So another relevancy.And then she went on to make history through Watergate and the reporting.What a different world it is now with Jeff Bezos running the newspaper.What's left?

Yes.That's very sad because she.Her son took over.Don Graham.

Yeah.

For quite a long time, and then a granddaughter.But.

It was a really good paper.

Great paper.You know, paper in D.C. for 30 years.In fact, my first writing was published in the Washington Post.I got an op ed in the Washington Post about volunteers and political campaigns.And my husband ran out at 5 in the morning to pick up five copies of the paper.And the first call I got, thinking my friends would all call me, first call I got was from someone working for Oliver North.

Oh, my goodness.

And a guy calls me up and he says, I want to talk to Robin Gerber.I said, that's me.He said, oh, you're a woman.I said, yes.He said, if you want to find volunteers in a political campaign, come out to Virginia in the Oliver north campaign.

But you championed Women.Throughout your career, you also studied Eleanor Roosevelt.

Before we get into that, I just have to interject.FDR is my 10th cousin, twice removed.

What?

Yep, that's right.Somebody did my genealogy for my birthday recently.I'm also.Barack Obama is my sixth cousin.

Oh, come on.

Yes, on his mother's side, the Durhams.

Funny, you don't look presidential.

Okay, I'll get your autograph.

Eleanor Roosevelt, you wrote a novel suggesting that she was running for president in 1952 against Ike.Do you think she would have won?

I think you all should read that book, Eleanor vs. Ike.I think I make a pretty compelling case and it very much comes down to the wire.I won't tell you which way it falls.She gets shot like her Uncle Teddy did.

And.

Goes on with her speech anyway.There's a way in the book that she transcends being a woman.And.

How does she do that?

Things like this.She's giving this speech and she gets shot and she insists on going on with the speech.She bests him in a televised debate and she talks about things like universal health care and housing assistance and things we're still talking about today.And then there's a racial incident with the Ku Klux Klan that happens on election night, election day.It's a great alternative history.

What was Eleanor's role in FDR's New Deal?

She had an enormous role.Harold Dickies Jr. Told me, and his father, of course was in FDR's cabinet, that they called her Franklin's hair shirt because she was always pestering him about some thing or another.And of course, unlike him, she could get around the country, which was great because he would send her places to come back and report to him.And she was a wonderful reporter in that.She didn't just say what there was.She analyzed things.But for instance, she went out to look at a housing project that he had been told was practically finished in Detroit.Low income housing.And she came back and said, no, it's not even on the ground yet.She went down in the coal mines, which of course women weren't supposed to do.She went out to the fields here in California to see what was happening with farm workers.She went to Puerto Rico, where there was terrible poverty and journalists followed her everywhere because the.And I don't know if you know this, but she's the first lady to hold press conferences and she only allowed women journalists to attend her press conferences.

Really real pioneer.

This very much pissed off Steve early, who is, who is Franklin's press secretary.It really pissed him off when she scheduled her first press conference before Franklin's first press conference.And the women reporters came in and they were so grateful because they were the first ones getting fired in the depression.They followed her everywhere and reported on everything.

What was her personal dynamic with Franklin?Didn't he have affairs?And wasn't she aware of that?

She was aware.Sadly, he had a most famous affair with a woman named Lucy Mercer, who was her social secretary in the 19, late 19 teens during World War I, when Franklin was assistant Secretary of the Navy.

She was tough as nails.

Well, she had her own affairs, by the way.

She was gay.

I wouldn't say she was gay, but I would say she was bisexual for sure.She most certainly had an affair with a woman reporter for the AP named Lorena Hickok, who was openly a lesbian.

I'm not bisexual.I've never paid for sex in my life.Oh.

God.If I, if I had,.

I say.

I had a rim shot.

I feel like I'm talking to my husband.

Oh, really?Oh, good.

He would fit right in with you guys.

Oh, that's great.

You also wrote a book about the founder of Mattel, the toy company, Ruth Handler, the mother of Barbie.

Before she was famous.

And you wrote a television production, Barbie and Ruth, the Story of the World's most Famous Doll and the woman who created her.

That's the book.

Tell us a little bit about that.

You know, Ruth Handler.When I wrote the book in 2008, of course there was no movie.So no one really.If I went to a gave a talk and said, anyone know who Ruth Handler is?No one raised their hand.No one had any idea who she was the founder of Mattel with her husband.But she was the driving corporate force salesperson.He was a shy, retiring creative who, who made the toys, who figured out the toys.

Wow.

And she had one toy idea and that was Barbie,.

Barbie,.

Who's a great corporate leader.The problem was, and I think the reason people didn't know about her is that in the 1970s she, she committed fraud and was caught and by the sec.And she actually was pleaded nolo contender to those charges and she was ejected from Mattel.

What did she do?

It was essentially stock manipulation.She was buying other companies with stock because if you own Mattel Stock in the 60s, you made double digit returns every year.So she started buying at the end of the 60s, she started buying companies with stock and when there was a downturn in the finances of the company, she hid it.

I see.

In order to keep the stock price up.And so that was discovered and she was criminally charged.She could have gone to jail.

What I really want to know is did she come up with the measurements for Barbie?

No.Yes and no.So she.It's a good question.So in 1958, she went on a European trip with her family and they saw this doll in a German toy shop that kind of looked like a prostitute with the body of a Barbie.And she'd been asking her toy designers to make an adult doll for girls.And they said, absolutely not, you're crazy.We can't make breasts.Mothers will never buy that doll.So they were busy making rifles and toy rockets and that kind of thing.So she grabs this doll in this toy shop, grabs, buys three of them, brings them back, says to her head of research and design, take this doll, go to Japan, that's where we were making things then.And.And copy this doll.So that's.That really is where Barbie came from.

Barbie comes from a German whore.

From a German whore.She was actually the doll in Germany.The doll in Germany was from a German cartoon where she was in fact, lady of the.

Night.Eh.Wow.

I remember reading decades ago when they said, did you ever look at the measurements of Barbie?If she was a real human being, she'd have an 18 waist.

Would topple over.

Yeah, she would topple.

Over.

She was an early augmenter.Wow.Who knew?Talk about trailblazing.

Yeah, she was a real trailblazer.She was a Jewish, a child of the tenth and last child of Jewish immigrants to America.So she is the classic child of immigrants who went on to do fantastic things in this country.It was on the LA Times bestseller list.

Wow.

No kidding.

That's it.Many years ago.Still buying on Amazon.Oh,.

Look at that.Barbie.Her inspiration, history and legacy.Robin Gerber.Fantastic.How.

About tickets for the show?

If you want to get tickets to see the Best Medicine with Caroline Aaron about the story of dealing with a long marriage and long term illness, you can go to the website for the theater, which is odysseytheater.com.

And is there a future for the show?Are you touring it?Are you taking it somewhere else?

Oh, we're certainly trying.We already have some dates for performances at Whidbey island.

And the shot is going to be staged as well.The story about Catherine Graham.

I'm having a banner year for a 74 year old.The shot's gonna be at the Wallace.

Great.

When is that?

Wallace Vandenberg Performing Arts center in April.

I read the play and it's fantastic.We will definitely talk about it when that comes up.

Oh, okay.

We'd like to have you back and talk about that.

Great.

Robin Gerber, thank you so much for joining us.And,.

Oh, by the way, you're not related to the baby, are you?

The baby food?

The baby, yes.Gerber?

No.

Okay.Just asking.

My mother used to lament that, but no, actually, what she used to say is, they're not Jewish.

Not kosher food.Okay.All right.Thank you so much.

Thanks, Robin.

Okay.All right.Thank you.

Take care.

Great.

If you want to hear all of our shows, go to sexyboomershow.com I'm Ted Bonnitt.

I'm Phil Proctor.

And we'll see you next week.