Neil Patrick Harris & David Burtka

It's a big, old, beautiful brownstone. You have to go up practically twenty steps to get to the front door, and it has quite a history. So how old is the house? Nineteen o five? Wow, it had been everything from a speakeasy for mill workers to music school for girls to a single person occupancy. When you think it was a brothel, No, I's just wishful. I began to wonder where in this five story house would we have

our talk? So who's the decorator? David has better taste than I do, so if we ever have disagreements about interiors, it usually comes from a financial standpoint. In that I tend to say, dude, we have dogs and two small children. We don't need a forty billion dollar rug, So you're the sort of decorator and you're the accountant. Then they led me into their red velvet screening room with rows of cushy theater seats, just like in old Hollywood. What

a fitting place to chat with these two actors. What kind of marriages did your parents sad? My parents were together until my mom passed away eleven years ago, and your parents. My parents are still married and they've celebrated fifty plus years of marriage, so they've always been only together with each other. So because you were gay, did you think you wouldn't have that? I thought that I was going to be alone or single for most of

my adult life. But I also had a random path from adolescence into adulthood because I ended up being on a television show when I was fifteen years old, and so all free puberty through puberty when you're figuring out what turns you on, I felt a bit under a microscope of television, and so I didn't have the freedom to randomly hit on somebody or go to a bar. So I was by myself a lot and had a fantas asked a group of friends in Los Angeles who

knew everything about me. But I just I just wasn't dating. I had never even showered with another person until I was in my late twenties, so it was all new to me. And what about you, David, I you know, I didn't know what I wanted until sort of I got into a college and then after college, living in New York, I, you know, I saw lots of different relationships and men having babies already and having a family.

So I always knew that I was going to settle down and be with someone and stay with someone and have a family and kids. Once we started dating, we never really stopped, So we didn't date lots of people while we were dating each other, and then decide we just started dating, moved in together, and we've been together ever since. The same sex marriage wasn't legal at that time, and it seemed like a potential but not an inevitability, and so we were more conscientious of what wording we

used to call each other. I just didn't like the word partner for some reason. I just I still think that's a very strange way to it eliminates any sense of lover. Gay lover sounds only romantic like you're just humping. Sounds a little invasive of your life. Eight Then boyfriends sounded very juvenile. Boyfriends like I was forty calling Phil my boyfriend saticular. Right, it seems like it's short lived, like we just met, whence you've been together for years.

So I just said better half and then and then once the marriage thing happened, it happened very quickly. But we didn't want to get married because it was suddenly allowed to get married. We want to get married to get because we wanted to get But you were already in a committed relationship, correct, and that was and did

you had kids? Yeah? I just didn't want to go to the courthouse with a with a hundred other people and people holding up signs and other people picketing and then photographers that I don't want to get married on that context. I want to get merride with my family right in Italy when it's legal and it's not a big deal. The nice thing about a destination wedding is you can easily reduce the number of people you can invite it. Yeah, it was a very small wedding. It

was only forty seven people. Yeah, we got married with thirty five and it wasn't. It wasn't a great wonderful. The nice thing about an Italian wedding or any Italian trip is that everything is so delicious there. And what was Tuscan Perusia? Yeah, the mountains beautiful? You know. One of the things that I've noticed, because we've been married forty years. Do you count from the day that you started dating or from your wedding? Now we're counting from

the day we got married. We met three years before then, but we knew immediately. I mean we fell in up, we went, we went to dinner, we went to bed. That was it the same, That's what it was. Because we're getting we count from the day over first day, sure, because and then you add ten years like a dog in gay years. Fifty years we've been together. So how

did you meet? David got a very coveted role of Tulsa in Gypsy that was starring Bernadette Peters and directed by Sam Mendez, and it was it was a role that every young male actor from the ages of eighteen, third and a half they tried to find. We're trying to get so David got this covered roll of Tulsa and the dainty June in that show as a girl named Kate Rinders. And I knew Kate Rinders from LA And so I was walking down the street. I was

doing another show on Broadway. I was the MC in Cabaret, and I was walking down the street and I saw Kate. We will pass by each other and I said hello, And she was with this very study dancer guy in a leather jacket, like amazing hair, and I just thought that she had a boyfriend that was really hot. I told her that. I said, who's a guy that you're dating. She said, David. Oh no, he's totally gay. I said, really, and then I started stalking him. Oh that's great, So

how did you what happen? We had similar schedules because we were both doing shows all the way. Yeah, we would and he would show up at different places. Kate would say, Oh, we're going this place tonight, and then Neil would be there at the bar. What is going on? This guy is looking at him. I had a boyfriend at the time and things weren't going so well, and then we finally broke up, and then I gave this guy a date. I was like, I was circling like

some sort of ulture waiting for them. But when I when I met him, first met him, he looked very strange. He had jet black hair and he had was very white and blue blue eyes, so he didn't necessarily look like Neil, So I mean, he was still handsome, but it wasn't like true I was in the character because DMC was Wimer Germany. So my armpits were dyed black, my hair was dyed black, my eyebrows were dyed black. Wow, so I and my my skin colors pretty pale. So

I looked like a vampire a bit. But then I had you come with Kate to see the show, and that was a very sexy version of Cabaret. If you remember Alan coming did it originally with Natasha Richardson, And it's walking around and sitting in people's laps in the audience and making out with the cast members. Yeah, it was. It was. I played the whole show to him, and look where I got there. You got yourself a mate.

So then it started. And then it started, yeah, yeah, And we lived in New York for a couple of months, and then we made the move to Los Angeles and it was nine years in LA isn't it? Well? It was it amazing though, because I'm now that I'm thinking

about this. We talked about being in the same industry and how that has its complications, But I don't think we would have connected in otherwise because we both had the same schedule, so we would all be hanging out at the same time post show ten o'clock where everyone

will be out having drinks. So it's easy to connect then and all day just to go bike riding and do stuff in Central Park and hang out turn a day because we have to work till the nighttime, right, and then we got to see each other in our shows, so you know we got it's always a turnout. Yeah, talent as a turnout, we'll have more. After a quick break, we're back to Marlowe's interview with Neil Patrick Harris and

David Burka. With two hot guys in one marriage, I want to know if either of them was the jealous type. M me. I think me. I can have a bit of jealousy streak in my body. I get very protective if guys are, you know, trying to make a move on him or rarely, please, did we know couples that have open relationships? I would just be worried all the time, like who is he with? And what am I not doing? And who? Why can't you know? Am I not good enough?

And so I'd go crazy if there was an open relationship, I'd you hire a private detective and I'd figure out where he's going. Sicilian No, I'm polish, um, but I think that I would, you know, tap his phone. It would be hard for me. Was that a discussion. When we started dating, our sex life was so strong and it maintained itself that three years. It was for long enough that that that the idea of opening up the relationship. We spent all of our time together all the time,

so it wasn't a relationship of convenience. When gay guys weren't able to be out publicly and stand so tall and be so proud of who they were, they had to pretend that they were someone else, and therefore promiscuity was understood because they weren't able to tell anyone and they were they were having sex on the sly. But now it's there's a normalization to it, and I think now in the same way guys would cheat on each

other if they're two guys. There's still an old adage that a guy that has a wife has a piece on the side, or a mistress or I mean, I think historically that's I don't think that that's unique to two gentlemen. I's a lot of the loop though, too. I mean, I don't know, there's the grinder and gruff and bumble and all these true we don't I don't. I mean, so many people are on these apps in there that's very sing left or right. I don't know what it is that's true. We started dating before any

of that miss that whole generation. It's a whole different thing. Like, but when you're with somebody who's well known, there's a that's an aphrodisiac of its own. So people come on to you because you're you know, you're somebody famous and that's exciting, right, yeah, right. And there's also there's also a bit of me being an actor and also having

the jealousy of hey, well what about me? Because he gets a lot of attention, a lot of attention like oh I'm here too, you know that, not give me the eye contact or like brushing aside or oh you're nice too. This is what true To and Sting talked about. If they all talk about that. So how do you deal with that? What do you do? Do you demand something more from him? How does that work? Because that's true in every field. If you're the CEO of a company,

you're gonna get all the attention and the spouses. Sometimes I feel like I say, behind, every great man is a great partner, it's a great mate. And then you know, I should feel happy and honored that he's sharing his time with me. And then other times I'm super upset and annoyed and I sort of just stop my feet and say, hey, you know, I need some attention here. And then what do you do when he does that?

I give him attention. That's easy. It was also even more challenging both being actors, and so I think it sometimes it is more the emotions more on the sleeve, because I'm sharing with him good news of some job opportunity in the same field that he wishes the opportunity was his own. And that's understandable. And weren't two guys, yes, and we're the same sex, which which amplifies it as well. You know, I was working as an actor in New York for a really long time and we decided to

move to Los Angeles. When Neil got a show in LA called How I Met Your Mother, and I wasn't having the best of time in LA but we stuck it out because he was doing a job there. So you know, you make choices to be with the person that you love. That was sort of the main thing I think, taking a backseat to my career a bit. Yet, such a weird industry as actors, because you're only kind of as good as your next random job that you get.

There's no job security in acting. You can be on a television show for seven years and then when the show's canceled, you're just auditioning again. It's not like you have tenure, and so it's a little bit complicated. But David has additional skill sets beyond acting, and so one of the things that came from a tenure in Los Angeles is that you find other things that you can do that don't require someone to tell you that you got the job. And David went to Lacom dying and

it was fast. It was a fast twenty days in hospital leukemia, and I just thought, I can't be in Los Angeles and be depressed and go out for auditions that I didn't want to do anyway, And so I went to Lacourt on Blue and became a chef and just started working right away. And then when did the kids come? He got together in what year? We've been fift together? Fifteen? They're eight now, right, so that would be six seven. It was recently after my mom died

eleven years ago. We looked at each other and said, life's too short. We gotta have kids now, because my mom really wanted just kids and Wally wanted grandkids, and so we thought, you know, we can't wait anymore. Let's just start the process of having a surrogate and eck donors. Having kids is a real game changer. And when you're two guys, you don't accidentally get pregnant as much as we tried, so we you know, that's not really an

option unless you make it an actual reality. I'm on a TV show, so we're making nice money, and so let's do it. One of the things I believe the strongest is that when same sex couples want to have kids, it's because they've really thought it through, because you can't accidentally do it. I said that in jest, but there's a lot of truth to that, and so therefore, when we have kids, we're ready for it. We didn't go no,

what's happening? Are we? Are? We gonna do this? It's funny when people think that gay people shouldn't have kids. I mean, they have to go through so many hoops and someone who's really thought about it having kids, and someone who really takes the time to do it. So what did that do to the love nest? Oh my gosh, it was rough. It was rough, and I have to say for the first five years, I wasn't sure it's gonna work out. I thought that were really rocky roads, Like I didn't know if I could be a dad

and be a husband at the same time. It pulled us apart, and yet it brought It brings you together, Yes, because you're having to do things once you have kids. It's much harder to just say that's it, I'm out. And yet you also have no time to say, let's stay up all night and drink and connect for till four o'clock in mark. All you want to do is get a little bit of rest and how do you say romantic and find that time when you have little children.

I'd like to know. I'd like to read your book and find out we make we make concerted efforts to connect. We'll have date nights. Date nights are staycase, or we try to go on vacation together, parlay a couple of days, or one or two days before after if we're traveling for business. An afternoon sex is underrated when the kids are not on from school yet. Wait ten minutes. You're waiting until everyone goes to sleep to have sex. You're gonna be a sleep or sex. You're all so excited

during the day. Tonight it's going to happen tonight. Your world is going to be rockeding. This is right. Yeah. I think for those that are looking to get married, if if you're if you're coming at it with the rigidity of what we have right now. We want to

maintain this feeling that we have right now. It doesn't stay that way because when you have sex with the same person over and over, it gets redundant, and then you can try different things sort of, but then it changes and then you don't like each other and suddenly you're not attracted to them, and then you have to figure out how to be reattracted them, but in a different way because you're aging. And then you have to figure. Then you're suddenly figure you're in love with like their

soul more than their body. But then you get in love with their body again. It's just it's more, it's it morphs, and I think, I think acknowledge that is tenuous and kind of dangerous because what does that mean. But in a weird way, we keep falling in love with each other in different ways over and over, and I think that keeps our sex life alive because it's not just we're not trying to continue to do what we did and then it's not going. Well, why what's happening? Oh,

there's no connection. We're trying, We're trying to do it, but it's not working. So I'm out, Like I feel like some people do that. What I've noticed in my friends, on our friends, some people don't know how to come back from a bad situation, whether it's infidelity or a fight or whatever. Either they don't know how to talk to each other, or there's their anger is so a manswa they would hold. So how do you fight? I think we just blurt out what we have to say

and we say it. There's a good thing, and there's a bad part about that too, But we don't hold anything in. We're actors too, so we can read your face like there's something wrong with them. I know immediately right what's going on. If you don't communicate, you're going to build up assumptions and you're going to have resentments, and I think that's more corrosive than anything. So the

lines of communications deserve to be open. Will they be fiery and messy, of course, But we've seen couples that pretended everything's fine when it's not, and then it feels like it becomes this chasm exists, and then there's so much unsaid that when it gets so bad, there's so much to say that you don't even know where to begin. So we see a couple's counselor and have done so weekly for most of our entire time together, like our fifteen years. Why did you do that? That's great to know.

Friends of ours said, you should. You should see a couple's counselor together before anything's wrong, so that you develop skills to communicate and develop ways to be honest around each other before it's bad, so that the idea of going to see a therapist together isn't because it's a last resort we go and see everything, we talk about all kinds of stuff. That's been really helpful because we know that for that hour or two hours that we're

meeting him, we're there to work. It's work. So good to take a moment you're in conflict, just go to your corners for a minute. You're not in the headspace to say, you know what, I'm all reacting. You're right. Is there something that you've noticed about yourself or about him that has changed? Oh? Yeah, for the last three years,

I've been sober, so I don't drink any alcohol. So that's helped a lot because that sort of not only made me more depressed, but it also made me more heightened to want to start a fight, or be more right, or be more headstrong. So that's been a big change. Did you do that because Neil asked you to? No. No, there's some substance abuse in my family, and I think that I owed it to myself and I owed it

to my kids. It's one of the things I'm just deeply proud about David is his determination to do that. It's a very hard, complicated decision, but it never got to the point where I was I was in jail or harmed an armed myself. My bottom was not bad, but it was bad enough that I needed to change. I could persevere anything and I would still be with him.

He's an amazing parent. And I think what makes what makes me love David is the depth of flavor, is of the the amount of roots that have been planted where you can't control where they go. And that's why it's fun, because it's always changing. You know. Well, we realize that we did do make certain decisions about things to change. I learned that I wasn't a very good listener and that when Phil had a problem, and it took about ten years, and one day he was telling

me something. It was very troublesome for him, and he stopped in the middle, niece and please don't say anything. Don't tell me anything. And the thing that bothered him is that I'm a fixer. So if somebody gives me a problem, I'm going for the phone. So I had to learn I know I can do this, but this isn't the way to do this with another person. Good point, I'm not, you know, And he one day he said to me, stop producing me. I can do it. And

it was big. I think in a relationship. We could all afford to just go with the flow a little bit if you missed the flight, and if the other person is to blame, there's no need to blame them. Here you are, you missed the flight. Now you can stay at the airport for a couple more hours. We spent a lot of time in our relationship coming up with individual expectations of how the party's gonna go, how the vacation's going to go, how tonight's gonna go, how how that phone call is going to go. And it's

rarely met. And you can be bothered by being inaccurate in your expectations, or you can just go with a new outcome. No, I think expectations is huge. What do you see that makes the marriage last? And maybe it's just the expectation thing, which is really better said than anybody is said. Laughter. I would have going to say laughter and see I really was, really is. I think that that's part of the reason, one of the main reasons we've been stayed together, because we just make each

other laugh all the time. He makes me laugh so much, vice versa. And that's Neil Patrick Harris and his husband David Burke. I sure wish I'd been there for that. I do too, you would have loved them, Ungil. Next time, I'm Marlow, Thomas Old, Donahue. It doesn't even have to be this, s Churchill said, every time you make someone laugh, you give them a mini vacation. And I just always loved that. This was great. Thank you. I really enjoyed

Double Day. There's a production of Pushkin Industries. The show was created by US and produced by Sarah Lilly. Michael Bahari is associate producer. Musical adaptations of It Had to Be You by Stellwagen, Symfinette, Marlo and I are executive producers, along with Mia Lobell and Letal Molad from Pushkin. Special thanks to Jacob Wiseberg, Malcolm Gladwell, Heather Faine, John Snars, Carly Migliori, Eric Sandler, Emily Rostak, Jason Gambrel, Paul Williams,

and Bruce Kluger. If you like our show, please remember to share, rate, and review. Thanks for listening.