Patti's After-Party: Debby Boone

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Oh, the places you will go! You know when something happens that’s so far from anything you ever dreamed of, something that never even entered your realm of thought? I had that happen recently. I received an email asking me if I’d be interested in interviewing Debby Boone. Would I be interested? If you’re talking about the Debby Boone I’m thinking of, you bet I’d be interested. Just like that I had Debby Boone on my calendar. What a crazy full-circle kind of moment for a person who has been such a pop culture junkie since I was old enough to speak. 

I was a fan ever since her 1977 megahit “You Light Up My Life” came out. I was only 12, but I already had a decent sized collection of 45 singles, and yes, I still have my copy of that record. I wore it out way back then, but I never got rid of it. I actually dug it out prior to our interview, just to make sure I really did still have it and it wasn’t just some wild memory I conjured up. 

So, yes, I really did have a phone conversation with Debby Boone. Was she all that I hoped for? She certainly was, only she was even better than I imagined she might be. It was like talking with a friend. She’s incredible. Let’s get into it.

Our interview started off with Debby Boone sharing that her sister was flying in from Colorado that day. She seemed happy about that so I guess I caught her on a good day! Always a plus. There’s a movie called Six Days in Evergreen that was released to streaming platforms Fandango and Amazon Prime on July 17th of this year, and Debby Boone is part of the cast. Before I go any further, I’ve seen the film and it’s excellent. I highly recommend it. 

“It’s a very nice movie with lots to say, but in an entertaining way,” Boone began. “There’s so much going on in all of our lives and it’s really a nice movie to just see and enjoy.” I commented to her that she looks simply amazing in the film and I wasn’t just trying to butter her up, she really does. She said, “That’s the one thing I’m really grateful to Shane (Shane Stanley, Writer and Producer) for, because even 20 years ago, if I went on camera for something, if the lighting wasn’t right I could look 10 to 20 years older. If the lighting’s great, it goes the other way around. So Shane did it right,” she added with a laugh.

The lighting wasn’t the only thing that was done well on set. Happily, Boone said, “The movie was cast really well and there were lovely people working on it. It was just an all-around really good experience.” I asked if she knew anyone in the cast prior to joining and she didn’t, but that obviously just made everything even better. “No, I didn’t know anyone, not at all, so it was kind of delightful to get to know people. I’d always been an admirer of Penelope Ann Miller (she plays Diane in the movie) and we didn’t really have scenes together, but I ended up hanging out with her quite a bit which was really nice.”

The storyline is compelling and well-written with an outstanding soundtrack. Songs included composers Tommy Fields, Shane Stanley, Ran Pink, Sean Levy and Gregory Darling. Debby Boone was so impressed that female lead Dawn Olivieri (Yellowstone, The Vampire Diaries) did all her own singing. “There are some great concert scenes, good relationship stuff and real redemption going on, and I always love a good redemption story,” Boone said.

She went on to describe the premise of the movie. “Dawn’s character Farrah and Johnny Whitworth’s character Cameron (Cameron is the son to June, played by Debby Boone) were first loves who worked together musically, and then she suddenly disappeared on him. She was his true love, but he put his life back together and was engaged to be married when Farrah came back to the town of Evergreen to perform in a show. Like anyone who’s had a first love come back into their life, those feelings don’t just disappear, even when there’s anger and hurt. When you’ve really been in love with somebody it gets very complicated, and when she comes home there’s some real unresolved conflict and trauma.”

So will Boone be doing more films in the future? “I’m not booked to do any, but yes, from your mouth to God’s ears, I really do enjoy it and hope to. I never really think of myself as an actor because, of course, primarily I’m a singer, but I’m always sort of surprised when I look back and take stock. I’ve done a lot of acting over the years. I’ve done a lot of musical theater, movies and television shows. It’s mostly been musical theater, but I love it and I love working with actors and having that kind of group effort, as opposed to being on stage as me, by myself. I do love that too, but it’s great to have the opportunity to do both and Shane gave me a great opportunity to be in this movie. So I’m definitely scouting out other ways to keep acting.”

That’s not all on Debby Boone’s plate these days, she has a cabaret show called It’s Been A While. It’s described as “A brand new show with a carefully curated set of songs that span genres and generations.” Stephen Sorokoff with broadwayworld.com raved about it, saying it reminded him of “glamorous evenings at The Persian Room, The Copa and The Oak Room during the Golden Age of nightclubs in New York City.” That’s a high compliment. The show was road tested in Los Angeles and New York and the reviews were glowing, so at the current time it’s being shopped around to venues throughout the country. Boone explained why the show is titled It’s Been A While. “It’s called that for a lot of reasons. It’s been a while since I’ve had a new show. It’s been a while since I’ve done a live album, well, actually that’s something I’ve never done yet, and it’s been a while since I’ve had an album period.”

I know I’m hoping for a show that I can get to because this is something right up my alley. My fingers are crossed. Boone ever-so-humbly shared, “We tested the waters in LA and New York and it did really well, so we’re willing to take it wherever they’ll have us.”

In 50 years, there’s absolutely no doubt that Debby Boone has talked about that song thousands and thousands of times. You know the one. “You Light Up My Life” was a true record-breaking debut single for Boone in 1977. It charted number one on Billboard for 10 straight weeks and sold more than four million albums. It was ranked number seven on Billboard’s list of all-time charted songs. It appeared in the movie of the same name and although some not-so-pretty drama came about during the recording of the soundtrack, with that track specifically, the public were largely unaware of it and it had nothing to do with Debby Boone directly. If you’re interested in the drama, I’ll let you do your own research, but I digress, I needed to ask Boone to please talk about the hit tune again, after all, I was a fan with a vinyl copy of the single. 

Some artists might dread going over the same story over and over, but not Debby Boone. She wasn’t the least bit hesitant to give it yet another whirl. I had to mention that I dug out the 45 of “You Light Up My Life,” purchased by yours truly way back in the day. She found that amusing and said, “Wow. That’s a collector’s item.” I’m not sure who might want to collect it, but I do love that I still have it. I was so curious how her life changed following the release of the song, I mean, you know it had to have churned up all kinds of new things considering how successful it was. She exclaimed, “Oh absolutely! It was interesting timing because I had been traveling with the Pat Boone (her legendary father) family band and singing and recording with my sisters as The Boone Girls. We were a quartet, a sister act. At the time I had thought about doing some of my own things and I was encouraged to go out as a solo artist by Mike Curb, he ran the record company. We just weren’t sure it was the right time because we were still working as a family.”

She continued, “Then my two older sisters got married and one was immediately pregnant and having her first child, so that came to kind of a very natural end. Mike came over to the house and I was still living at home. He brought over a cassette tape and encouraged me to put my voice on the tape’s track. I had to fly to New York to do it, but I didn’t know it was a song from the soundtrack of the movie You Light Up My Life. They wanted to remove the original singer's vocals and replace them with mine for the single. I just thought it was an opportunity for me to go into the studio and do my own thing for the very first time. I didn’t think anybody would ever hear one word about it, but now we know what happened, and nobody was more surprised than I was that it became the hit that it did.”

Actress Didi Conn played the lead character in the film and one year later she hit it big playing Pink Lady Frenchie in the megahit movie Grease. Conn lip-synced the title track for the movie. Kvitka “Kacey” Cisyk’s vocals were used on the actual track in the movie, but it was Debby Boone who sang the single version that blew up into a hit. “I’m sure it was to the great frustration of the girl who did the singing in the movie,” Boone stated, “and it was due to some conflict between her and Joe Brooks, the writer and producer. I never had the chance to meet her (Cisyk), so I don’t really know what she did in the following years, but she’s no longer with us (she passed away from breast cancer in 1998), but I always felt bad for her. It’s just business, I guess.”

So far there are no concrete plans to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the single, but keep up with Debby Boone on Instagram for updates. It would seem like a no-brainer to do something because it was celebrated on its 40th anniversary in a big way. Boone elaborated, “When it turned 40, believe it or not, it was released for the very first time on an album/CD. It had never been digitized before. I think there were some things floating around, but the album as a whole had never been re-released digitally.” 

Speaking of birthdays, it seems Ms. Boone will be having a birthday soon. She will turn 70 on September 22nd and her comment about it was one of the best I’ve ever heard. She said with a laugh, “You know, your song can’t be 50 years old without you aging 50 years right along with it.” 

I’m not sure what 70 is supposed to look like, but if it’s old and falling apart, that’s not Debby Boone. As I said earlier, she looks great, but she had more to say about milestone birthdays, and I felt like she was grabbing thoughts right out of my own brain, as I’ve thought pretty much exactly the same thing many times. “I really think this, of all the birthdays that I’ve celebrated, seems the most surreal. It just doesn’t feel like it could possibly be true, and I think it’s very normal for people as they age, to realize that the ages they thought were ancient when they were young feel different as they hit those milestones. I’m going, ‘Oh my gosh, this is not what I thought 70 would be.’”

I say it all the time, I may be in my 60s, but I still feel like an eight year old inside and I shared that with Boone. She replied, “I have the sense of humor of an eight year old.” I do too and I’m probably just as clumsy as one. When I look at pictures of my grandmother at my age, I can’t help but think she and all her friends and relatives looked much older than I do. That said, I am looking at those photos through a 61 year old lens and maybe I’m just seeing what I hope I see. Boone added that things have changed a lot over the years and we do have more things available to us, like hair color and cosmetics. I have to say that day-to-day fashions appear to be more youthful now as well. I think that helps. Our conversation veered off into The Golden Girls for a minute, with Boone mentioning that the majority of the four main cast members of that show were in their 50s when it started. Not one of them is still with us now, but the show remains a favorite of both of ours.

If we had to talk about “You Light Up My Life,” then we had to talk about Pat Boone. He’s an entertainment icon and according to Boone he’s doing great. She related, “He’s 92 years old and he just returned from Iowa where he was doing a big concert. He has a new project honoring the late Ritchie Valens. (The concert was held on August 7th at the Surf Ballroom in Clear Lake, Iowa, the last venue played by Valens, Buddy Holly and The Big Bopper before they were killed in a plane crash on February 3, 1959.) There were all these guest stars celebrating ‘the day the music died.’ He did a lot of the music that he recorded from that project and some other songs. Then he flew back home and I’m gonna see him this afternoon with my sister.”

I told her I thought it was beautiful that he’s still able to enjoy life at 92. She agreed, “It really is. He stays so busy that we beg him to slow down.” It’s also so nice that he has family nearby. Boone clarified that she’s the one who lives closest to him and she has a sister who lives in Orange County, California about 90 minutes away. Her other two sisters live in Colorado and near Seattle, so they don’t get to see their dad in person as often as they’d like, but family Zoom meetings help keep everyone connected.

One might wonder what it’s really like growing up with a famous parent, so I posed that question to Debby Boone. She said she and her sisters mostly grew up just like regular kids, but she explained why. “To the credit of my parents it was really a priority for them not to let their kids grow up in sort of a privileged, unrealistic fantasy land. We grew up having rules and regulations and chores. We weren’t just handed everything on a silver platter. We had to learn the value of things and had to earn them. There was just a lot of love in the household and there was our deep faith that was the center of everything. That wasn’t typical of most Hollywood families. I think we were envied by my friends because they loved to come over and just be with a big family. We’d gather together and be swimming or singing and laughing, but that wasn’t the experience of most."

I asked her, “When you’re not singing and acting, what do you like to do?” She replied, “We adopted a dog. It will be two years in December. We hadn’t had a dog in quite some time because we just didn’t really know if we should, I think it was partly due to the time we're at in life, but we were definitely so fortunate to find this dog. He’s a part of our lives that we’re just crazy about. There’s a lot of responsibility that comes with having a dog, but the joy and love that entered our home, and the fact that I miss this guy when I travel and can’t wait to see him wiggle with joy when I come home is so worth it. I just love him. I take him to dog parks and I just got back from walking him. I got back just in time for this call. That’s a huge source of joy and it’s how I’m spending my time when I’m not working. I’m with this big, believe it or not, Saint Bernard Doodle.” I asked his name and she told me it’s Lenny. I always want to know how dogs get their name and I was curious if he was named after any specific Lenny. Well, there’s a story, actually there are two.

Boone revealed the details. “When we found him from California Doodle Rescue, my daughter and I and her boyfriend drove about an hour away to the foster to see if he was going to be a good fit, and he instantly was. He had been rescued from a backyard breeder. They had 13 big Mastiff Doodles that were just in a little yard with a chicken wire fence and they were not being well taken care of. I saw a picture of this guy online and I fell in love with the picture. When we were driving to get him we were starting to think about names. We were looking at names on billboards and making a list on paper of every name we thought might be good. My daughter said, “You know, those dogs are really inbred, so we may wanna think about ‘Lenny,’ (as in one of the main characters in the classic book Of Mice and Men) you know, like ‘Lennie (the spelling in the book) don’t pet the rabbit.’” I laughed at that. I hadn’t thought of the book since it was required reading in high school, but it reminded me I’ve never seen the Gary Sinise / John Malkovich version of the movie, so I made a mental note to do that soon. If you’ve never read the book or seen the film, Lennie enjoyed touching soft things, like rabbit fur, but Lennie was mentally challenged and wasn’t always very gentle. You get the idea.

That’s one story. When Boone’s husband heard the name Lenny he liked it, but he preferred to name the dog after Leonard Rubenstein and call him Lenny for short. Either way, once you see a photo of Lenny (on Debby Boone’s Instagram), you’ll see it really suits him. He’s so adorable!

Moving on I asked a random question. “If you could have any object or place in the world completely to yourself for one day, what would you choose?” She responded, “That’s a big question. You know, what comes to mind because it’s always been on my bucket list is… oh gosh, here goes the senior brain, you’re gonna have to help me because you’ll know what I’m talking about when I describe it.” She said it was an island or group of islands and started to say, “Galap, Galapa…” Oh, yeah, I knew, “The Galapagos Islands, where all the turtles are!” (If you know me, you know I have a bit of an obsession with turtles.) Boone jumped in and said, “And all the animals and wildlife! It has always been a place where I think I would just be in awe, like Dorothy in Oz or something. I would just love to have that opportunity. Everybody I know that’s ever gone says it’s just heartstopping and life changing. I would really love to do something like that.” Me too.

To end things I asked Debby Boone what in her life has been one of her most memorable “Center Stage” moments, where she felt like she was truly center stage, whether she actually was on stage or doing something else. She answered, “Well, well, well, there are so many things that come to mind when you ask that question. I will say because I just came back from New York, that starring in The Sound of Music at Lincoln Center for their 30th anniversary of that show was one of the highlights of my career. You know, just being center stage doing that beautiful show in that beautiful venue in New York City was really a dream come true. All of my musical theater experiences have been thrilling. Also on the list would be being on the stage at the Oscars and the Grammys and sharing the stage with my mother-in-law Rosemary Clooney (yes, she married into a famous family just like she was raised in one). It was amazing and having our kids in the Christmas show with her was wonderful. So we’re all standing there doing this joyful Christmas show and getting to learn from, sing with and enjoy my mother-in-law in that way was phenomenal.

For a final thought I commented to her that although she was born into a famous family and married into one as well was so interesting because she seemed so firmly nailed to the ground. “Well, I hope so, I have every reason to be because of the way I was raised and the wonderful family and good friends I have around me. Like I say, my spiritual life is what I have that helps keep my priorities straight.” It’s certainly working and to date, she’s one of the best interviews I’ve ever done and I mean that sincerely.

Follow Debby Boone on social media and if you drop her a line, tell her Center Stage Magazine sent you!