I'm Jonathan K. Parton. Welcome to K-Part. We're extending the holiday weekend to bring back

my fabulous conversation with the great Billy Porter. He's a singer, actor, and producer.

He's won a Tony, a Grammy, and an Emmy. And Porter is everywhere. So much so you'd be forgiven

for thinking he just burst onto the scene. But he's been preparing his whole life for this

very moment. The life and the career that I'm having right now is because I'm ready.

Because that's been 35 years in this business getting ready. When everybody

had decided that my time was up, that as a black gay, flamboyant, as I've been labeled,

artist, there are only so many spaces that you are allowed in, sir.

In his memoir, Unprotected, and in this conversation, first 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 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

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. And he called me up. And he was like,

I think you should write a memoir. So from 2014, until I turned in the book earlier this year,

I have been working on in some form trying to put my story down on paper and do it in a way that

felt, you know, of service. You know, how could I be of service? Like, that's what my life has been

...