I wanted to make some more changes to it, so I got all those changes done. I had rewritten “Funny Girl” which was done in London and then went on tour in England, and we were bringing it to Broadway. At that time, we were supposed to be doing a production of “Bye Bye Birdie” at the Kennedy Center. I sat down and did all the work on my desk. Like everybody else in the fucking world, this pandemic hit. So, did I write the memoir because of the birthday? No. This one says you were born in ’54,” I had to keep saying, “Why would I lie and make myself older? I’d only make myself younger!” It’s another one of those examples of why you should never lie. Every time I mentioned my age he sent back a note, “Wikipedia says you were born in ‘54. So, I wrote the book, and there’s a fact checker, of course.
My mother was born in Brooklyn and my father was born in the Catskills. But it got picked up by everyone and everywhere it said I was the son of Eastern European immigrants. They were actually third-generation Americans. I think it was in New York Magazine that they got the facts wrong and said my parents were Eastern European immigrants. Things just get picked up by this one or that one. The next year, we decided we’d do it again. But if you start at 21, who the fuck’s going to care!” That year, I moved my birthday to ‘53. The reason is that when I turned 22, my friend Eric Conklin, who directed the original production of “Torch Song,” said “You should tell everybody you’re turning 21.” I said, “Why?” He said, “Because if you lie when you’re older, nobody believes it. What’s really funny is that so many sources, if you look online, have my birthday as 1954, even though it’s actually 1952. Harvey, why was now the time to write your memoir, “I Was Better Last Night,” and does having a milestone birthday (70) in 2022 have anything to do with it? “I Was Better Last Night,” by Harvey Fierstein.
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