Midmorning With Aundrea - October 12, 2020 (Part 3)

(Part 3 of 4) She's been working since she was eleven months old.

Now actress, producer, and entrepreneur Drew Barrymore can add talk show host to her resume.

We meet up with her on the set of her new show that will air on CBS.

.

Drew barrymore first attracted notice as a very young actress - with a very famous last name.

Lee cowan recently talked wityh barrymore about her very own t-v talk show!

"i don't know i you're interviewing me or i'm interviewing you.

I'm not really sure."

"and hopefully we'll never know because it will be an unguarded, respectful conversation."

Drew barrymore is all about 'conversation' these days... "it's the dre barrymore show.."

Starting tomorrow - she'll be doing a lot of it - debuting her new talk show on cbs...from a studio just down the hall - from ours.

"welcome to ou set, lee.."

We were a little envious - her studio is a lot bigger - she even has her own kitchen.

"lee: are you cook, though?

Drew: i am.

But i'm not, like, sexy and cute and cool while i cook.

I-- i look like blablablhablhablh ab!!"

As you might imagine - launching a talk show during a pandemic - is hardly optimal.

Her planned studio audience - has been replaced with a virtual one.

And for guests who can't sit with drew in person - thanks to the magic of television - they can appear to be sitting there anyway- in 3d -- from a studio the other side of the country.

"we've gon through so many-- moments-- since filming the pilot a year ago, that this show probably wasn't likely gonna happen."

Oddly - all the challenges she says - just might have made the show better.

She's not hiding from this awful year.

Instead she's meeting it head on - with what she calls intelligent optimism.

"how, wit everything goin' on, whether you-- it's just the pandemic or just racial tensions or just the election coming up or just the economy, how do you find optimism in all of that?

Drew: we sit around and we try to be as thoughtful as possible.

// 15:37:59 i'm not a total pollyanna.

I get that there is a huge divide.

I don't wanna pretend that there isn't.

But i would rather find the things we have in common than harp on our differences."

Talk shows are certainly in her wheelhouse - "i've been waitin to meet you my whole life and it finally happened.

Johnny: your whole life."

&her first appearance was at age 7 - on the tonight show starring johnny carson.

"it would be kind o easier to talk without my teeth.

Johnny: what are you talking about?& as she grew- so did her talk show acumen - she never failed to disappoint.

"&music as sh flashed letterman then kisses him..."

David letterman probably still hasn't forgotten that.

"i think if there' one thing in a very long life in front of people is there is a line.

There is tmi.

And i kind of know what that line is, and it's a feeling.

It's not the same for everyone."

"have you talke to david letterman or jimmy fallon or-- anybody about, you know, how do you do this and what's the secret sauce?

"all of the above actually" "is there on thread of advice that they all have that's the same?"

"they all say pac yourself, which of course, i in my stubbornness was like, i've been working since i was 11 months old!

You don't even know my work ethic."

"oh baby, i wish had some magic&" tv commercials came before she could talk - but it was a scream that got her noticed.

"screaming& her role as gertie opposite the world's cutest alien made her a galactic sensation& problem was she was just as cute as e.t.

And for a while - that's all anyone wanted to talk about.

"e.t.

Phone home... "is there one thin you've never been asked about e.t.?

."

"it's been a whil since people have brought up e.t.

One minute, you're like, i'm never gonna not be e.t.

And then, all of a sudden, its 38 years ago, and you're like, e.t."

When she did emerge from et's shadow - she was no longer the innocent little girl.

Drew largely skipped childhood - turning to drugs, drinking, rehab, even attempted suicide.

She lived a lifetime before she was 14 - when she was legally emancipated from her abusive alcoholic father, and her troubled manager- mother.

"when you loo back at, like, those days in court, when you were emancipated, do you see an adult there?"

"i see someone wh knew that i probably was all i had.

So, it was like, you figure it out or there's-- you know, you're gonna go the way of the clich?, as they say."

It was pre- ordained - if you believe bloodlines carry a storyline too.

The barrymore's were a hard partying hollywood dynasty - lionel and ethel barrymore, and her grandfather, the great john barrymore - all had reputations drew knew all too well.

"come on, can i ge you a glass of milk honey?

Drew: milk?

I'm a barrymore, get me a drink and make it a double!"

"i pushed the limit a lot, many different times in my life.

And i'm very lucky.

I know that.

I tested, i pushed, probably too far-- many a time."

"but you alway came back to the center, somewhere?"

"well, i at leas tried to meet that blessing with having learned something."

Nat/sot 50 first dates her lemons ended up some pretty tasty lemonade.

She rebounded - both in front of and behind the camera.

When she was only 20 - she co- founded her own production company - flower films - which soon had her starring in - and producing -- films like charlies angeles.

Nat/sot charlie's angels - 2000 she dove into business too - with a successful cosmetics line, flower beauty, and more recently - a furniture and clothing line too.

"i've also had m "i've also had m career go away.

I was blacklisted at, like, 13.

I mean, if that doesn't give you some perspective and gratitude for every job you get, nothing will.

I mean i am working!!

This is amazing!!"

All of it while raising her two young girls - olive and frankie - whom she had with ex- husband will kopelman.

"i wanna be al about, you know, the pillars of appropriateness and decorum.

And i don't lie to my kids.

I'm like, i had to find my way here.

So, yeah-- i've lived a lot of different lives, and this is where i'm at and this is what's important to me now.

// 15:55:12 my kids have inspired me to be the best person i have ever been in my life, and i thank them every single day for that."

Nat/sot sizzle reel she knows daytime is a crowded time slot - talk shows come and go, after all.

But if drew barrymore has proven anything in her 45 years - her superpower - is her staying power.

"i know i'm making show for other people.

So, whether they're right here in this room or watching, hopefully, somewhere, then this is for them, for sure, for sure.

I'm not doing this for myself!"

A day that changed the world also changed the life of a high school senior.

What that means all