Andy Cohen has an unusual knack for turning his own self centeredness into a charming trait.
That Cohen-esque warmth was in full display at the Marcus Jewish Community Center Book Festival Saturday night. And he made sure to throw in a few Yiddish words for the sold-out crowd.
"Thank you for schlepping out on a Saturday night," he said up front.
And later about being nervous in front of comics such as Jimmy Kimmel and Will Ferrell: "I was schvitzing like crazy!"
He mentioned Jerry Seinfeld's mother's shiva and in the book, he talks about the food. "What you do," he said, "is eat as much as you can while you honor the deceased. The food was outstanding. I had to detail what I ate!"
Mara Davis, the pop culture doyenne of Atlanta who now works Atlanta Eats and WABE, asked him questions about why he wrote his book "The Andy Cohen Diaries," bodily functions sprinkled throughout the book (including Lady Gaga's urine turned into perfume) and who he would love as a guest on his show "Watch What Happens Live" that has yet to appear (Michelle Obama, Madonna, Beyonce.) He later told Davis he was so happy with the talk, he hoped to make her a guest bartender on his show sometime in the future.
Credit: Rodney Ho
Credit: Rodney Ho
He also talked about his dog Wacha, who always comes on the set at 11:24 p.m. "He'll be in the office on a couch," Cohen said. "Then at 11;24 p.m., he comes out and knows the way. There are 40 people waiting for him. He goes crazy. That's the love story in my book. He transformed me."
Davis asked him about Wacha nipping TV host Tom Bergeron. Cohen said Tom was playing too aggressively with Wacha. Like a typical dog owner, Cohen blames Bergeron, not Wacha. "He was taunting him," Cohen claimed.
She also asked the same question I did in my interview with him a couple weeks ago: why is "Real Housewives of Atlanta" the most popular in the franchise. He gave pretty much the same answer: the show is imbued with both humor and drama. "It's real life drama," he said.
She wondered about how much of the shows are "set up." He said the annual trips are a way to guarantee the women have to interact and the cameras are on them pretty much 24/7, which isn't the case when they're leading their regular lives.
Another quirk he likes to include in "Housewives" episodes is what they order to eat - although we seldom see them ever actually consuming food.
He also said he tried to bring Jill Zaran back to the New York version but the other housewives mutinied. He was also pleasantly surprised that Bethenny Frankel was willing to return to the show for the upcoming season.
During a Q&A, he was asked to play a couple of games he plays on his own show.
A fan asked him who he would marry, shag or kill among Lisa Vanderpump, Kim Zolciak and Jill Zaran. He would marry Lisa, shag Kim and kill Jill. (Jill is the only former housewife he was even willing to tweak publicly.)
Another had him play Plead the Fifth, where you could skip only one question. (Mara said she didn't do it because that would have been too predictable.) Her questions: which celebrity at a party would drive him nuts. "Dance Mom lady," he said, after much thought. A recent celebrity hook up? Lance Bass. Least intelligent housewife? Plead the fifth!
One person asked if he'd ever consider Atlanta as a home to a "Top Chef" season. He said he would but didn't say he would definitely do it. At best, he said, "Atlanta is ripe, ripe like a peach."
And the moment he knew he had "made it" was when his talk show was expanded to five days a week in early 2012.
Plus, he did draw the line on the focus on himself. When someone asked him to do a show where his friends would interview him and fans would ask him questions, he said that was too much. "That would be too self centered," he said. Even for him!
TV preview
"Watch What Happens Live" with Andy Cohen
11 p.m. Sunday through Thursday, Bravo
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