Pop Culture Confidential

Episode 6: Kevin McEnroe & Our Town

Our Town, the critically acclaimed debut novel by author Kevin McEnroe, begins in the Golden Age of Hollywood and is a fictionalized account of his grandmother actress Joanna Moore - her life, passions, addictions and ultimate self-destruction. Kevin McEnroe, son of tennis legend John McEnroe and actress Tatum O’Neal, talks to Pop Culture Confidential about his book, how writing it was a very personal turning point and how his grandmother saved his life. Host/Producer: Christina Jeurling Birro Producer: Renee Viterstedt Editor: Tom Hansen Theme Song: Carl Borg Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Duration:: 29m
Broadcast on:: 11 Jun 2015
Audio Format:: other

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Kevin McEnroe's book, "Our Town," has only been out a short time but has already critically acclaimed and praised by, for example, director Peter Bogdanovich. He calls the novel insightful and filled with the triumphs and tragedies of show business life. A life not unfamiliar to Kevin McEnroe himself. He is the third generation of his family to be in the spotlight. His father is tennis superstar John McEnroe, his mother, actress Tatum O'Neill, who at 10 years old became the youngest Oscar winner in film history for Paper Moon, in which he acted opposite her father, actor Ryan O'Neill. Dorothy, the beautiful young protagonist that we meet at the beginning of McEnroe's book, is actually inspired by his own grandmother, Hollywood actress Joanna Moore, who acted in over a hundred roles for film and television. She was married to Ryan O'Neill and together they had Kevin's mother Tatum. The book follows Dorothy, arriving in Hollywood in the 1950s and throughout her life. As she falls in love and marries the more successful movie star Dale, she has a taste for abusive men and a huge desire to be the best mother she can be, but her addictions to alcohol and drugs and self-loathing finally overpower her. The story unfolds through rich descriptions of Southern California and Hollywood that can give so much but take it all away without mercy. Kevin McEnroe, who has a master of fine arts from Columbia University, says that through writing Dorothy's story he learned to understand his grandmother's struggles. Substance abuse has haunted his family through generations, from his grandmother to Tatum O'Neill's private and public struggles through his life. Kevin himself hasn't been immune from the family's troubled history with addiction or the media's attention with it, but is with great insight and empathy and raw honesty that Kevin McEnroe dives into the human condition in our town. Mr. McEnroe, I'm so honored to talk to you, congratulations for all the success with the book and thank you for talking to me. Thank you so much for having me, I really appreciate it. Why don't you describe the book and the story that you wanted to tell? The book for me is it's based on my grandmother, Joanna Moore, who was my mother's mother. I was older. I colder my nan. I was very small. I only met her a couple of times, but you know, I think it was just an exploration of somebody. I attempted to, I was curious about her when I first started writing and I just was trying to figure out sort of why that was. And I think it's because I think both of us share a sort of ability to get in our own way when we feel success approaching. And so the book for me was sort of telling the story of somebody who I think is considered a sort of in my family and I think sort of in general a sort of cautionary tale, a sort of a screw up. And I just felt there was a lot more to work than that and I just wanted to under, you know, how you can, you know, I was hoping to try and tell a story where you could make somebody sort of do things, if you just looked at the facts, you know, I think she did a lot of things that were probably considered sort of untoward and some capacity or sort of, you know, as though she doesn't have a moral compass. But I think she was always trying to sort of just figure herself out and I think she never really could, I think she never understood that it was as, it was as simple as when good things seemed to approach her, she didn't believe she deserved that. You know, so I think the book became about, and then that was my first inclination was to make a, you know, an empathetic story about somebody who made a lot of mistakes. And then also paired with that, I really wanted to tell a story about Los Angeles and tell a story about how there's a lot of beautiful things and beautiful people there. But there's also a lot to be aware of and be weary of and be, I have a very sort of love-hate relationship with the West Coast and I wanted to provide a place that could seem sort of romantic and glamorous but also seem, I mean, you know, a bit scary and a bit vapid. You call your grandmother, or a bread in an article that you call her your guardian angel. Why? Because it was, I think it was in my struggle to understand what it was that connected the two of us. I think I learned what she never did, which was that if you believe in yourself, even a little, you know, you can allow certain things to, certain positive things to happen. And I think with this book, I finally figured that out and I think she never did. So it was almost like in honoring her, she sort of saved my life, you know. Why do you think she never figured it out? I have circumstance, drugs and alcohol probably didn't help, you know, she felt that I think she probably had it even like harder than me growing up. So she felt she didn't quite understand what it was that made it hard for her to be the person that she sort of wanted to be. I think drugs and alcohol for her were really a disassociative, so she was able to just live in the immediate. I think if you just live in the immediate like that, you can't really give your, like sort of have the overview that's required to figure out a kind of a bigger picture scenario of just like I made a mistake moving on. You know, I fucked up again, you know, God, I can't believe I keep fucking up, but not being able to understand together why not being able to look at all of the fuck ups and when they happened and why they happened because I think for her was just you had, I just had to block it all because it was just a little bit too much to bear. Why do you think it was different for you then? It wasn't for a long time. I think it was only when I went through some hardships that, you know, I felt were similar to her and then I, and then I think it was when somebody called me and said they wanted to publish this that I thought, you know, for example, just to be specific, I found out, you know, about a year ago that there was a publisher interested in selling my book and that night I went out sort of celebrating and I got arrested for the first and only time in my life. And I also, I hadn't really signed the book deal, I had just been offered and I thought they were going to pull the book deal. And so when I came out and they said, we're still behind you, we still want to do this with you, it occurred to me that I was doing exactly what I always was. I thought of it as just, this was her life for a long time, but there was no more acute ways for me to understand that, oh, this is why I'm doing it, this is what I have too. And so I felt like it was just because it was like, it was like given to me, it was like a sign like, oh, you can't do, like I now that I know that I, that we share this bond, I can't, I was like, just the awareness allows you to figure out to not do it anymore. You can't just, I think her thing was always, and I think I had this too for a long time, you know, be better tomorrow, you don't look at the past, you don't look at the reasons why you do all these things, but just try and be better tomorrow. And if you don't understand why you've been screwing up, I think it's a lot harder to actually do that. I think you just end up falling back into the same pattern, and I think once I understood that even after I'd done something, I considered very stupid, somebody still cared, it was like, oh, okay, now I need to like actually see that, take it very seriously, and sort of move on from there. And I think in that way, I've actually been able to be better tomorrow. Because you've actually been writing this book for nine years, this was from when you're went to university and we're studying writing, so this, this was basically done then is what you're saying that night you got arrested. I thought it was over, yeah. I almost feel like, you know, I've never been religious, but it was like, it was hard to believe that she wasn't sort of looking out for me right then. And you have a tattoo of her as well, is that after this then? This is like three weeks ago. Okay. Yeah, I was thinking when you were saying that you've been writing this story for nine years, so you must have thought a lot about her. You went through your mother's problems that we've heard of. I'm just wondering, do you think there's a genetic component? I mean, at some point when things maybe I shouldn't try anything at all, or is it just the self sabotaging that you go through again? For me, I feel felt like and still do feel like that what I've inherited is the sort of self sabotaging gene rather than the sort of drug. I think drugs and alcohol go very well with that and they can allow you to do that, but you can do it in a lot of different ways. I've found drinking, not drinking any of those, like there's lots of different ways that I've been able to get in my own way, so to speak. And I think that's what I've found that her and I share. My mother, I think, has it too. I think hopefully she's attempting to believe that she's sort of worthwhile as well throughout all of this. Hopefully I help with that. What does this book meant to her? It must have been a pretty big deal. I mean, it's such a beautiful book about her own family. Yeah, it took her a very long time to read it because I think she thought it was too close to home or something. When she finally did, which is when sort of my galleys came out, which I guess is seven months ago, something like that, she called me crying. I was always scared that she was going to feel like it was too dark or something, but she called me crying and she said it was like somebody actually understood her, which was sort of amazing because I tried to purposely not at it. I didn't want to interview my mom about her. I wanted it to be my own understanding of this woman, not sort of biography of the woman. This was your picture. I'm just saying that Joanna is named Dorothy in the book and it's your picture, not your mother's picture of your grandmother, I guess. It was like, she said it's like it's not that it's not her mom, but it's like her spirit exists within not only the Dorothy character, but within the sort of understanding of the world, the book hopefully provides. Right, right. She's very, very proud and happy and she's been great throughout this process. Do you mind if I read a little passage from the book about Dorothy's struggles that I thought were particularly gripping as a mother? Sometimes some mornings when she felt like acting better, she'd write herself lists on napkins or envelopes about the way she'd try and change, how tomorrow would be different about how much more she'd do about the kind of woman she could be. Work out tomorrow. Call pony. Get better. Do more. These same mornings, Dorothy often asked Clover to hide her cigarettes. I really just love that passage because there's something so devastating about just wanting to be better every day and how she really has this in her and then when she can't, it's that self-loathing. What does that do to a child who sees their parent doing this? In the beginning, when I was young, I think it was very easy to think, I'm sure it was very easy for my mother to think as well, why are you choosing this over us? We have to be more important that your kids have to be more important than your insecurity laced ability to attempt to forget. I think as I got older, I think you realize that there isn't, it's not a choice in that way. It's not, it doesn't work that way and I think I probably didn't entirely understand that until you go through some of that yourself and then you go, "Oh, it's sort of like you're not thinking in an overall understanding of your world and your parenting, but you're just attempting to feel, just attempting that you feel so bad that you just can't feel that way anymore." There's no other choice. I think it was hard growing up, but I also, I'm sure it was hard for her, but actually I think in writing the book, I actually felt I sort of understood much more what she was going through and I hope maybe even she understood what her mom was going through too and just in terms of, I think she was trying. I think there were certainly moments, probably some sort of moment every single day where she thought, "Today is the last day, I'm going to keep this up, tomorrow I'm going to be a good mom, tomorrow I'm going to be, I just can't today." Today is over, I just need like a me day, but tomorrow I'm going to be, but then when you keep putting it off and putting it off and putting it off and not realizing why you're putting it off, I think it can just sort of go on in perpetuity. I think that's sort of what happened to her. And did it piss you off? Probably all of the range of emotions. I think at first her angry, but then very quickly sad, anger doesn't really get you anywhere. In that circumstance, I mean, it can, in that circumstance, it just, that makes you, I think that made, if you attack somebody in that way, it upsets them even more, you know, and then they push you away even more. The self-loathing element in the book of the characters, where do you think that comes from? Because that comes before the addiction. I think that, you know, when you have a, there's a pattern of feeling like when your parents sort of aren't as around, or around in the way that you need them to be, then you can feel like you don't understand what it feels like to be told, you know, you're doing the right thing. But I do think a lot of it for me is genetics. I do think a lot of it, there's just something about, I don't know if it's necessarily self-loathing entirely, as much as it's sort of, like, I don't know if Dorothy would say that she hated herself. I think Dorothy didn't even realize that I think Dorothy just thought she wasn't meant to be anything, and was sort of happy in the darkness in a way that she didn't want to be, that she was a mom and stuff, but her instincts and her instincts and what she felt inside were just to be like, sort of meant to be a piece of shit, and sort of meant to be to not succeed very much, so that's where I'm going to be. And then there was a strong part of her that wanted to fight against that, but I think it's the self-loathing that comes before, but what the drugs and the alcohol do probably is keep you in that state of, you're unable to move beyond, you know, it's like you can perpetually say I'm going to get better tomorrow because something allows you to just think right in the moment, and then, you know, right, it's like right before, you know, you have your first pain killer, you write, okay, this is the last time, and then you have your first pain killer and you go, oh, that's, thank God that's over. But was it different for your dad, who was such a top athlete, where success seems like it was the only option, could he understand these things? In me? Yeah, or in your whole family going back, I mean, this sort of running element of being afraid of success or self sabotaging type of thing, when you're an athlete and you used to sort of, I have to win, I have to succeed. It's probably, I mean, I would want to say anything inflammatory about him, but there's probably some element of him feeling like if he lost, you know, it was so devastating that you sort of had to keep winning. I think he found losing, you know, I don't think he liked winning as much as he hated losing, you know, so I think that there's probably something about sort of running from feeling like, like, I don't, you know, people, I don't think, I guess in order to be great at something, you have to hate that, though, but his competitiveness, certainly something that he's made a career out of. But was it hard for him to, yeah, I don't think it's, it's not, it's not in him really so, which is why I think maybe I've been able to overcome a lot of that because I think I'm partially my father who is a, you know, a success driven, ambitious, you know, the only choice is to succeed. Right. Yeah, because there's two sides of a coin here in terms of, yeah, right. I think that he's been very supportive and has been, you know, perhaps he, I think he doesn't, he didn't understand when I wasn't doing that well because it's like, you're really smart. Why aren't you, why aren't you doing better? And I think maybe some of his positive pressure and feeling like, feeling like, you know, hit the natural, like, I remember feeling like he told me once, you know, because my mom, and we're taught anytime, anything good has happened with the book. It's like, my mom is like, oh my God, you know, wants to throw a parade. My dad is like, yeah, like good job. And I'm like, God, you know, it's hard to learn because you're so, you know, it's not that big of a deal to you. And he's like, what do you mean, aside that he would deal to me? It's like, I always assumed you were going to be great at this, you know? So in a way, it was like, Oh, he even bleeped. It's not like a surprise. Like he even believes in me even more than I thought. So that was. But would you like him to said it more than you didn't really know? I think once I understood that, I realized that maybe that is almost better. It's almost like, it's almost like, it almost sometimes feels like pity if my mom, you know? So it's just like, Oh my God, I can't believe it. And it's like, well, you know, there's probably a happy medium, which is why I have both of them. So I'm happy. Well, I want to talk to you about how you describe Los Angeles in the book. It's almost, I mean, you can correct me if I'm wrong, but like a character, the places where Dorothy and Dale live and move to through their relationship. And then when it's over from Hollywood to Malcolm, they're like sort of mini descriptions of what they're going through their inner lives. First, it's a beautiful love story. And then it goes, what is Los Angeles meant to you? I was born in Los Angeles and I moved from there when I was five to New York and I've sort of been here ever since. But I have a very, I'm ambivalent about Los Angeles in a lot of ways. I have a very, I always feel like I'll go there's at my mom for two weeks and it'll be like, Oh my God, I totally get it. This is the best. And then like two weeks later, I'm like really wanting to leave. So I have, I have a kind of, but what is it the, is just Los Angeles in general or is it the celebrity fame money part of Hollywood or? I would say it's the people, yeah. I don't even know if it's necessarily just the celebrity because that's not, you know, you don't see that everywhere, but it's more, there's a sort of a, there's just a different set of, it just doesn't, it feels sort of like a surreality. I'm sure I would love it. Like I love Big Sur, which I clearly, which is probably evident in the book and I, I love certain parts of it, but I don't know, there's something about, um, I guess for me, the joke I always make with my brother who lives out there is that if you're always wearing shorts and flip flops, then you're just sort of always on vacation, you know, and I, I can't, I like wearing pants, I like the seasons, I just seems like there's something surreal and bizarre about, I also got us to play in the last time and I remember feeling like, you know, it was like 72 and perfect and it was almost like, it was almost like not even weather. It wasn't hot or cold, it just wasn't anything and I was like, in a way, it felt like how I feel about it over there sometimes where it's just, there's not, it's not even anything with the priorities are very different, the moral compass is very different, the, I don't find that people are particularly sunny on the inside, I think that they're always chasing something. What, what is your feeling of celebrities? Um, I think it's very dangerous, um, I think that, um, you know, if you have, you have to have a very, very, very strong understanding of yourself, strong sort of, uh, moral compass, strong sort of, uh, confidence, like confidence that isn't based on what other people think of you because otherwise, you can be very quickly, very quickly beaten down. And even when, you know, I think for Dorothy, probably even if you're the most beautiful woman in the room, you know, 99% of the time, if one relationship goes awry and it sort of rattles you, I think that there's not a lot of other places where that can maybe ruin you for the rest of your life, you know, but because it requires such a deep under, a deep ability to sort of be told, you're not good at this, try again elsewhere. You know, there's not a lot of jobs like that. Are you ready though? I mean, this book is really critical success. I mean, you, you have fame in your life, of course, the celebrity sort of, but in terms of your parents, but for you, now you're going to go into it on your own. I think it's a lot easier when you can really stand behind your own, your own thing. Like, I'm very confident in this book being good. And, um, and yeah, no, I mean, there's certainly, certainly things that have rattled me, you know, some of the press, I don't, you know, it's hard for me to do and some of the, so you know, it's much easier for me to talk long form about the book than some of the people that only ask me about my parents. You know, I think it's a lot easier when it's your own words and it's in your own voice. And I do have in sort of innate confidence that's built up over a long time that at the very least, I know I like this versus, you know, something like acting where you're sort of, you know, to believe that you're good, even when somebody tells you you're not good over and over and over again. Is there, is there any truth to the rumor that this is going to be a mini series? That's in the works. Oh, great. Do you have like a, you know, producer and all that? That's in the works. I can tell you're not allowed to say anything. Yeah. As people interested in, there's, you know, I'm just trying to figure out who the best, the best route. But yeah, that's certainly, that's the idea. I mean, either a show or a mini series. So that would mean that you would sort of extent do more about Dorothy's story. Yeah, a mini series would be the least amount of work probably. If it was a show, I wouldn't mind going back into, you know, my editor always calls it Mad Men on the PCH. Well, great title. Yeah. So I always feel like I could go into a pitch meeting and say that and somebody would be like, oh, that sounds pretty good. Plus, I don't think there's a very good, at least on American television, there's not a great female sort of anti-hero. You know, we have, there's the John Hammes, there's the Don Drapers and the Walter Whites of the world. But there's not really a woman who can sort of do bad things and sort of, people are still on their side. I think that, you know, they get it a lot harder. So I want to, I would love to do that. And maybe your mother could play her. Certainly the older her. Yeah. I mean, if it was in three parts, I had this other idea of making it three different, like if it was a mini series, that would be three different actresses. You know, so there's like the 19 year old, the 35 year old, the 55 year old, say. And that would be one way to do it too. But yeah, so that would be, that would be, that is, you know, I'm working up another book, but that's also something that I'm very, very interested in. Is there any sort of element of forgiveness in this book for you, for sort of all the generation? Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. How would you describe that? I think that I innately attempted to understand or to forgive somebody I didn't really know, but who I knew other people hadn't forgiven. That was the easiest thing. And then I think it became, you know, really understanding a lot of what my mom went through and trying to sort of put a lot of my own experience with my mom into, to imbue a lot of those, that relationship and those experiences into the book. And then lastly, I think forgiving myself for, you know, at times feeling like I was, I never, I didn't work hard enough, or I didn't try hard enough to be good at this, or I was sort of screwing around and not taking my life seriously enough. And to feel like, you know, sort of onward and upward and to stop sort of wallowing in the past, because I think that it's like, it's like Joanna, or I guess, the birthday or whoever, gave me a second chance at this and just a two, you know, because like I could say, it took, you know, I can say it took me nine years. It wasn't like I wrote it nine years every single day, you know, there were certainly years that I took that I wasn't writing enough, that I wasn't taking it. It wasn't until I felt like there was something there. I guess now that it makes me believe in my, forgive myself, which I think it allows me to believe in myself at, you know, to make this a career, can you continue on and to be just sort of a person who's on slightly more solid footing. And it's almost like, that's one of the things I call Joanna, my guardian angel is just because it's like now, now that this came out, it's like I've got to keep, I have to do it for her. It's like she gave me a second chance. You know, I got to like sort of kick ass and make it make it really something. Thank you so much. This was really interesting and I really, really enjoyed the book. Thank you so much. If you need anything else, let me know. Thank you so much again to my guest, Kevin McInroe. And his book again is Our Town. There's a link up on popcultureconfidential.com to Amazon where you can purchase the book. Also, we'd love to get your feedback on the show, either on the site, popcultureconfidential.com or Facebook, Instagram or Twitter. Thank you to Tom Hanson for editing the show this week. Music is by Karl Bohry, producer Renee Vitichtet and myself. I'm Kristina Yerling-Biro. Thank you so much. Hello podcast fans. It is I, Bruce Volanche. For over 25 years, I worked on the Academy Awards, so you didn't have to. In that time, I've seen and heard things that should not be seen or heard or certainly built. And now, for the first time, I'm sharing all my behind the scenes stories and firsthand knowledge about the Oscars, the blood, the sweat, the tears, the slap, all the things you didn't see. So join me as I use humor and insight to break down the Oscar Awards of the past to explain how and why your favorite movie didn't win, why some actors and some directors had to fire their agents and how the whole process works or sometimes doesn't work. This is the Oscars. 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