I'm Jonathan K. Pard and welcome to K-Pard.

What's the first thing you think of when you hear the name Billy Porter?

Is it his groundbreaking Emmy-winning pre-tell in the FX series Pose?

Is it his show-stopping voice that has garnered him a Grammy and a Tony Award?

Or is it that Tuxedo gown he wore to the Oscars in 2019 that broke the internet?

He's not an overnight sensation, but a star in the making since he set his eyes on Broadway as a child.

The life and the career that I'm having right now is because I'm ready,

because I've been 35 years in this business getting ready.

When everybody had decided that my time was up,

that as a black gay, flamboyant artist, there are only so many spaces that you are allowed in, sir.

In his memoir, Unprotected, and in this conversation,

verse recorded on December 7th for Washington Post Live, Porter talks about his unstoppable journey

from the poverty of Pittsburgh to the fame that envelops his life now.

And as a heads up for listeners, he also talks frankly about the childhood sexual abuse he suffered.

Hello, Jonathan, I'm so excited to be here with you.

It is so great to talk to you again, and you know what, I went back into my into my my records

and discovered the last time we talked was May of 2020, and at no point,

did you mention that you were writing a memoir?

Were you already working on it when we talked?

Oh my god, I've been working on it.

I mean, truth be told, since a agent came to me in 2014, I had my first play while I

yet lived, debut off Broadway, and an agent came to see it, a book agent came to see it,

...