Rosie O'Donnell

"Ok, she's nice, already. But as the talk-show host enters her second season, she's also toughening up her act."

Rosie O'Donnell - 35, single mother of 2-year-old Parker, TV phenomenon - is sitting in the living room of her apartment on New York's Upper West Side, wearing a "No Fear" t-shirt, shorts and sneakers, accessorized by what appear to be some slightly wobbly but nevertheless winning Magic Marker doodles on her legs. ("My son loves to do tattoos," she says, "so we do them. And yesterday, at a WNBA game, a 2-year-old baby was there and he was crying, so I sat him on my lap and we did tattoos. It doesn't come off for a couple of days.") In short, except for a certain amount of inherent personal charisma and some nice gold highlights in her hair, there are few signs that this is a woman whose syndicated talk show is one of the major success stories of the season just past. And that's putting it mildly. where most entertainers achieve, at best, a cult of personality, O'Donnell has, over the past year, achieved an impact such that what she endorses - whether it's Listerine, Tickle-Me Elmo or not being so goddamned nasty all the time - not only stays endorsed but is often hailed as a major cultural event.

A daughter of Commack, Long Island, NY, the shades and cadences of which live on in her accent, O'Donnell has knack for listening not only to her guests but to a signal, inaudible to anyone else, from her audience. To watch her greet John Travolta with a gesture that's half shaking hands with a peer and half dancing star struck at a cousin's wedding is to see the wishes of the audience made real in a tangible way, a way that anyone could imagine being part of.

O'Donnell takes this knack for duality - for being both star and regular gal - seriously. While not pretending she doesn't enjoy the privileges of wealth and success (like Letterman, she celebrates freebies on the air, though with considerably more sincerity), she also makes a point of using the show as a venue for charitable fund-raising. Her deal with Listerine, whereby it contributes $1,000 for the For All Kids Foundation, O'Donnell's umbrella charity for disadvantaged children, every time she kisses a guest, by itself has raised $500,000.

And it seems that being a force for good is its own reward. Things are, as it has become a cliche to observe, looking pretty rosy for The Rosie O'Donnell Show. Reports of trouble behind the scenes (four directors in eight months) have settled down, and the last few months of the season closed out under the stewardship of her new director, Arthur Forrest. ("I think a director and the producer and star of a show, which is what I am, have a sort of marriage," says O'Donnell. "So we kind of dated a few people, and now we're trying to get married.") Plans for expanding and refreshing the show's appeal (animated vignettes from the child's - and mom's - eye view) are under way. And a few potential roles in films (the movie version of Chicago, an adaptation of Angela's Ashes) might be just beyond the horizon.

All that remains is to settle back and continue to be good for America, and that comes naturally. "People will step up if you give them goodness," says O'Donnell. "You know, we only gave them lowbrow examples of the human condition for a long time on TV. And if you give them something better, they will go for it."

What do you think television in general gives to the culture now, as opposed to what it gave when you were a child?

When I was growing up, television gave hope and fantasy and ideals, which were not always accurate but were comforting to the audience at home. When there was a show with social issues, like Room 222, it was the exception, so you really talked about it [in hushed tones] "Did you see what happened on Room 222? there was a new black kid in school, and the other kids didn't like him." Now, it's so common, all the dysfunction, that when there is a show that's ideals driven, like Touched by and Angel, that's the one that stands out. Touched by an Angel is the Little House of the Prairie of the '90s.

Do you think shows or movies should be protested, on the basis of their politics and values, for sexism or racism, or homophobia?

Well, with TV, I think that you have the ability to turn in off. If you are morally opposed to Dennis Franz's butt on NYPD Blue, don't turn it on. And if you don't want to see Basic Instinct, don't go. If it really irks you, write a letter. There have been things that really bothered me in films, and I will call the producer and go, "Would you please tell them that i thought that was really horrible?" But that's my personal standard.

An example?

I was very offended, in Con Air, that the only character that was ridiculed was the gay guy. Here are a planeful of mass murderers, the most vicious, vile creatures, and they're all intelligent, they're all well-spoken, they're all given reverence by the others. Except for the little gay guy who comes out with no lines and no character development and just puts on a dress and everybody in the audience laughs at him. It's like in the early days of movies when they used to do that to black characters. Now there's the typical queenie gay guy. If you did that with any other minority, there would be hell to pay.

Ok. In what ways are you typically Irish?

In all the stereotypical ways. I have a stout physique. I look like my mother's relatives and my father's relatives. And in the pictures in Angela's Ashes, by Frank McCourt -

You look like Frank McCourt's relatives?

Yeah. I felt very Irish, reading that book. His father would come home drunk and sing these songs, and I knew all of them. so i'm reading the book on vacation, and i'm singing the songs, and my Jewish friends who were with me are like, what the hell are you doing? and i'm going see we have a history too! we have our own history!

Even though you're not, are there ways in which you're typically Jewish?

Actually, in some ways I feel more Jewish than Irish, because I grew up in NY and because of that whole sense of family from the expressive part of the jewish culture. YOu know, do anything for family, the family is the first priority. Linda Richman is a good friend of mine - Mike Myers' mother-in-law, who he did on SNL, with Coffee Talk. And she's always like, "Ya like my lawst dawta." But I do feel a mixture of Irish and Jewish.

You've been open about your family situation - your mother's death, your father's withdrawal and your estrangement from him. has being a parent changed any of that?

Before my son came, I used to dream of my mother as a hippie. I used to dream of her with long hair and that she somehow... in my mind as a young kiid, i maybe thought that she moved away, you know? I never got that she died until I was older. And I dreamed that she moved away because she didn't want to have so many kids; she was stressed out, and she wanted to be a hippie in California. So I would always dream of her with long, long, straight hair, which she didn't have. And when I've dreamed of her in the last 2 years, she's been a woman in her 60s, as she would have been if she were alive now.

Let's go back to issues of popular culture. Besides the music we know you like - Bette Midler, Neil Diamond - do you have anymore FM tastes?

Fleetwood Mac would probably be the most FM I got.

That's still pretty soft. you're from Long Island - where is the Pink Floyd?

Never.

Shame on you.

Lynyrd Skynyrd? Never. I used to make fun of all my friends who liked them. You know, now i'm friends with Iman and David Bowie, and I tell David - which he can't believe and makes him laugh - I first came to know him with China Girl You know when I got interested in the rolling stones? Just to tell you a little more about me? When Bette Midler sang that song with Mick Jagger, Beast of Burden.

What sitcom family would you most want to be a member of?

The Partridge Family. I'd like to be the kid between Laurie and Danny. Because what better fantasy for a kid who wanted to be a performer and a singer than to have a family who all got along and loved each other and got to sing sold-out concerts. I would play drums. I would kick Chris off and put him on tamborine.

It's interesting that you picked a child's role. What sitcom mom would you want to be?

The first thought that came into my head - which is not even a mom - is Hazel. Because Hazel was sort of one of the kids and one of the adults at the same time. The kids loved her and revered her and thought she was witty, and she spoke to them on a non demeaning level. And the adults also found her witty and amusing and insightful.

Ok, but what if you had to be a sitcom mom? It's not easy. They're good women you don't particularly want to be.

All the ones I think of weren't moms. First I think of Rhoda. She wasn't a mom. Then Mary (Richards). She wasn't a mom. All the cool ones weren't moms.

But now you're a mom on TV. What do you think about, the moment before you walk onstage for the show?

You know when you go on a roller coaster and it clicks up and then right after the last click before you go into the whoosh? That's what I feel. It's almost like when the audience member is doing the opening announcement, I hear the click and then I just go for the ride. It's the one hour I don't have to think in the day. It's like free time, like a kid in nursery school where you get a one hour nap. The one hour I'm there, I don't have to think of anything else. I just have to be in the moment.