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Pitbull and Kelly Clarkson talk about insecurities, imperfections and doing things they believe in like the movie ‘UglyDolls’
Los Angeles — Pitbull and Kelly Clarkson, both amazing singers, couldn’t help but say yes to "UglyDolls," an animation movie directed by Kelly Asbury that has the central message of accepting and loving one’s self, warts and all.
The movie tells the story of the UglyDolls, a group of reject dolls who live in Uglyville. They visit the town of Perfection, where the lovely and perfect dolls are trained before entering the real world. Here they realize that they don’t have to be perfect to be loved.
Aside from Pitbull (who does the voice of Ugly Dog) and Kelly Clarkson (Moxy), the animation also features singers Nick Jonas (Lou), Blake Shelton (Ox), Janelle Monae (Mandy) among others.
We were able to talk to Pitbull and Kelly Clarkson and below are excerpts of our conversations with them:
Pitbull
How much can you Pitbull relate to your alter ego Ugly Dog?
Yeah, Pitbull is playing a dog, what a coincidence. (laughs) For one, I don’t have an ego; and two, it’s not really not even an alter ego. It’s really myself and that is what I love about this character.
What I really love about the movie is that for one, not only did I have a great time and enjoyed, it was a project I was excited about, to be able to partner up with “UglyDolls.”
I love the message of the movie. It’s something that is really needed in society right now, especially with social media platforms and what is going on right now. I want to switch the words from followers and likes to being leader and unique.
It’s cool to love yourself. There’s nothing wrong with that. That’s needed right now in society more than ever. So Ugly Dog is a motivator. He’s inspiring. There’s no problem or challenge that he can’t tackle and he’s protective. He sounds like somebody I know.
Have you had any issues when you were a kid about your physical appearance or any other insecurity?
Plenty of them, that never ends. But I have a particular story that if it wasn’t for my mother teaching me a certain lesson, it wouldn’t have changed my life the way it did.
When I was in first grade, I lived in a neighborhood that was heavily populated with Haitians and Miami, a melting pot. There were so many different neighborhoods, you were either the outcast, or you were part of what was just going on in the neighborhood.
I would go to school after being jumped and after learning that that’s life and you got to face your fears. I would go to school and they would say, ah look at you man, look at that little clown nose. It messed with me a little bit.
So when I went and told my mom, she said, "Here is what you are going to do tomorrow: You are going to go to school and you are going to honk your nose, and you are going to call yourself a clown."
I am six years old and I am going “Mom, this isn’t going to go well in school.” But I did it and it worked. They never messed with me again about my nose. So I took that approach in life. People say something about you, own it. Make fun of yourself. That’s what Ugly Dog is about. That’s why the message is perfect. It shows people that perfect doesn’t exist.
In this industry, your outsides are glorified. Was there ever a time when you considered yourself less?
For me, yes, in this industry, it is glorified. But now more than ever, not only is it glorified, it’s not even real at this point.
When you see a picture of someone, you don’t know if they were Photoshopped, if they put a filter on it. So this level of people trying to achieve perfection, doesn’t exist.
The fun part is when you figure out that imperfection is perfection; that’s what this movie is about. That’s why they go from Uglyville to Perfectville and they are the fun ones. They are the ones having fun and one of my favorite parts of the movie is when they go to say hello, they just get in Perfectville, and the people are like ahhh!
They don’t know no better, so the guy goes hey, I think this is how they say hello around here. Ahhhh! (laughs) That’s where, I am not hoping, I know it’s going to make a connection with the kids to a certain point and even the parents who are taking the kids to the movie going wow man, we have really let things get out of control at this point and we forgot what this is all about. What this is all about is enjoying the road that we call life. (laughs) And owning those imperfections.
Starting fresh every day, Moxy (Kelly Clarkson’s character) feels this is the day she is going to get out and then it doesn’t happen. Was there ever a time in your life where you wanted to get a goal and start to doubt yourself?
It happens every day to be honest with you. I think that doubt is a part of the motivation, that challenge of you going through it right now in the music industry.
The music industry being independent artists at the level that we play at, there are certain things that they would use to run through the machine that go a certain level. It would get there six, eight months and boom it’s around the world.
That may take me from an independent artist. It might take me two years now to do that. So throughout that period, you may doubt and go wow, do the people still love my music and am I not understanding what is going on right now? It’s not at all. That is what it is all about, the fight, the struggle, the pain where you can wake up and go no I have got to do this. Because if you don’t have that, you wouldn’t understand the difference between a win and a loss.
You need to lose in order to appreciate the win. I know it’s animation, but it has a really deep message which is needed right now. That is why I partnered up with them and am excited about it.
What keeps you grounded? Was there ever a time in your life where maybe your success has gone to your head?
What keeps me grounded was the way I was raised, always to be appreciative of any opportunity.
What keeps me motivated is life and the minute that you are who you think you are and pardon my French, you are f*****. I wake up in the morning and I say, and this is true, every day above ground is a great day and I am going to enjoy this ride.
Since we are talking about movies, this thing called “life,” in this movie, everybody dies. So the question is, are you going to be the director or are you going to be the actor in that movie?
For me, that’s what keeps me grounded and that’s what keeps my feet on the ground, because there is always a new challenge and thank God we are in a position to be able to help. For people to get to a certain level in their career or their life, that should be an obligation, and a lot of people don’t look at it that way.
Because, just to make this full circle with the movie, they are in Perfectville and they are too worried about the things that they don’t need to be worried about. Instead of really appreciating what they can do and not just for themselves.
So many musicians come out and talked openly about how pressures in this industry often results in depression or drug addiction. Do you think the industry puts too much pressure on you?
Two things with pressure, pressure busts pipes, or pressure makes diamonds. It all depends on what you do with pressure, right? I was very blessed to be raised in Miami, in the ‘80s and watch the whole drug game unfold.
I watched entrepreneurs. They just had a different product: cocaine. My product is music. But the hustle is the same. So that growing up, watching that, built me for the industry, because they don’t pressure me. I pressure them.
This isn’t something where they go, “oh no, I need you to look like this; I need you to do that.” No, I already knew. If you don’t know where you are from, you don’t know where you are going. So I understood my roots and my culture. I go back to how I was raised. So that allowed me to take on the music industry.
What’s happening right now is that the younger these kids get picked up and you take them through the Disney Channel and then give them their career and you give them all this, they never had the time to figure themselves out. They don’t have an identity. They don’t know who they are.
There’s a difference when you maneuver and navigate somebody, but they get manipulated, that’s a big difference. So remember, I have watched this happen and I have been in the game 20 years now. I got in the game when I was 17, 18, but I had already been in another game. (laughs) There they don’t manipulate you. There they kill you or you go to prison.
That’s what built me to be able to have this conversation. Just to circle back, that’s the difference between Uglyville and Perfectville. People, if you grow up your whole life in Perfectville, you aren’t going to be ready for the game. But if you grow up in Uglyville, you are looking at Perfectville going “ha ha and you don’t even know how much fun we really have.” I am going to find ways to circle it back all the time.
You talked about your childhood and you talked about yourself as a kid. Tell me about your kids. What have you told them about where you are from? Because I am sure they were raised with money and gifts.
No, I am very different. Example, like one of my kids sleeps on the floor right now. You don’t bring me grades partner, alright, I will take your bed.
One of my kids came home with bad grades. I took all he had — phone, this and that, and I put it all in the pool. You let me know if technology could swim, then I might respect it.
My kids, I teach them how to invest. I am their bank. So they made some money for their birthday party. I said look, if you got 100 dollars, you can put 20 in your pocket and you can invest 80 with me, and I will pay you one point five percent a month on your money and on holidays, I will pay you three percent.
At this point, these kids have developed and understood the value of hard work. They take out the trash. They drop something, they pick it up. They pick up their plates and if they leave clothes around, I put it in the garbage and I am like, you must not want this. I put it in the garbage. Oh, where are my shoes, go check them in the garbage. So that is the way I raise my kids.
If they work hard, then they earn the right to do certain things. For example, one of my kids got on social media. I told him, the only reason I am letting that slide is because I am letting you know, you bring home straight A’s. They are in Drama. They dance. They do what they love to do. I said you have earned that right. But I will, as a father, advise you, not the smartest thing to do, and the minute you slip, I am snatching you. I am letting you know right now. So just like anything in life, we work hard to be able to do anything we want to do.
What was the nickname you had in mind before you picked Pitbull?
My name before Pitbull, when we were rapping, we called it freestyling and battling and this is what you would do, so you would come up from the top of your head and rap against somebody.
One of the guys I was rapping with, his name was J-Hot. The first name I had was Squire —J-Hot named me that. Being Squire, I didn’t really pick it up like that, and I was looking for a name. A Dominican kid I was hanging out all the time told me while we were on our way to a pitbull fight and he said that’s your name, Pitbull. So if I were on my way to a Chihuahua fight, it might have been different. (Laughs)
Actually, Jeb Bush told me a good story with that one, because he asked me the same question, “yo, how did you come up with Pitbull?” And he told me, “hey man, good thing you weren’t on the way to a cockfight.” (laughs) I said “Jeb, now that is funny man. You should have used that on the debate man. You would have been alright.”
Kelly Clarkson
Your character Moxy sings “It Couldn’t Be Better Than This” — if it didn’t happen today, it will happen tomorrow. But not reaching your goal can be pretty defeating. How do you turn that around?
Goals change. My goal in my life was to be a background singer. Obviously, that didn’t work out. (Laughs) That was my goal. (Laughs) So obviously life, God, whatever, had a different plan for me.
So I think that’s the thing I tell, especially people on “The Voice”, is don’t box yourself into this idea where you think you’re going to go. I never in my wildest dreams or thoughts thought I would have a talk show. I’m doing a talk show starting in the fall. And I think, always say yes to things that maybe make you a little uncomfortable and you just never know what your path is going to be.
People set these things and they go, this is what I’m going to do, this is how it’s going to happen. And I’m, great, life doesn’t work like that, you can’t make bullet points and…it’s going to totally work out on paper, life it’s not. And that’s ok. That’s the thing that I tell them on “The Voice.” Don’t box yourself in, don’t limit yourself, don’t think…you’re dreams change.
I never thought I’d get married, I definitely never thought I’d have kids, cut to married with four. Life throws you a different path. It’s not that it’s not as amazing, it could be more amazing.
We can’t limit ourselves and that’s really what I try and tell them. I feel like, me and Jennifer Hudson especially, having worked with her on “The Voice,” we’re really good examples of that because our careers have gone completely different ways, from the same start, we both are good singers, but you just don’t know.
When you are not working, you don’t wear make-up. Do people say in a weird way, you look like Kelly Clarkson?
It’s generally good. My whole career, I don’t know how I got by with this, but even from “Idol,” I’ve never been the unattainable star where people freak out and go ballistic or nuclear on people.
People get excited, but a normal level. People are really cool with me. They feel like they voted for me, I’m a part of their family; it’s more of that kind of vibe. I don’t think people see me as the unattainable star, which I did because I’m not. Those stars who you’re, God, I see those people in person and you’re taken aback. Some people just have a different level of captivation, I guess. Generally, I’m super down to earth, so they’re very comfortable with me.
How do you take care of your voice? Have you ever thought at some point, oh my God, I could lose it?
No, I’ve never been, luckily at a point like that. I’m blessed because the training I had when I was younger, I sang opera growing up, so I’m very much into warming up my voice. I’m very disciplined in the fact that I’m a boring person on tour. I’ve never really been rock and roll; I keep it low key on my bus. Because I also come from very humble beginnings and if I had money to pay for a ticket to see someone and I had to pay a lot, for me, giving that money means a lot. So you don’t want to suck for those people who have been saving their money for that.
Even the tour I just finished, we were doing three shows in a row, and I don’t know if you’ve heard my catalog of music, but they’re not easy songs. So I was really disciplined, and I try and stay very trained in that sense. But the unfortunate part is if you get sick, especially with kids, you’re at the mercy of your own health sometimes. But in those circumstances, vocalists also get in trouble because you don’t realize… you feel lazy saying no, but sometimes you have to say no, you can’t do everything.
Would you ever do a Broadway musical?
Oh, I would love to do a Broadway musical. I grew up in theater. But my whole issue with that is I just don’t have time because you have to block off a significant amount of time. I would love to step into something, but honestly, I’d love to do something from the ground up. I just think it’s fascinating to be the first person to do a role rather than stepping into something that’s been done and you can imitate. Not that I’m against that, but I would like to do something more from the ground up.
Right now I barely have time for the jobs I have (Laughs) and also four kids. So I won’t be able to probably do that any time soon but I love theater. Theater is why I got into music. Other than singing in church, seeing “Les Miz” for the first time when I was a kid was the end-all. I thought, this is magical. I have to do this for the rest of my life. Then that dream didn’t work out either. (Laughs) I haven’t done that yet either. Another box I can check maybe.
Can you talk about the Kelly Clarkson talk show?
I love her. This is a great subject. (Laughs) Well, honestly they convinced me… because a friend was, are you insane? Did you run out of everyone to ask? Then they explained it to me as they loved how especially people dug how I did the Billboard Music Awards because I didn’t feel comfortable necessarily doing it how everybody did it, so I incorporated music. That’s what I do so it made sense.
So we carried what I do on tour over to the show. I started the show singing an artist I love, a minute and a half of their song, and just really highlighting people who really are inspiring in the moment or maybe have been in the past. Then we move into me connecting to the audience, which I do on tour anyway, so that was second nature.
It was really funny because my very first interview was, actually I don’t think anything will be worse than that one, because my father had just passed away and I had to do an interview with Chrissy Metz. We have a very similar upbringing. So I was, and no one knew, trying to be cool but honestly, it was my first interview. I was, are you serious? But anyway, I think after that I was, ok you threw me a fastball right off the bat, cool, now I’m ready.
After that, it was like I got to talk about the #MeToo movement with Terry Crew actually, which I thought was amazing because I didn’t actually know his whole story.
Then I got to work with this amazing group of people who do amazing things for these homeless kids on skid row — I had no idea there are 300 kids living on skid row. So the cool stuff that you’re able to do that I watched Oprah do as a child, which was one of my favorite things that we all watched after school. So it was my favorite thing to do to be able to watch her connect people who maybe didn’t generally connect in the first place or have a lot in common.
And just make things super inclusive and show people where they can put their time or money and effort and interview people and have fun. I did a whole thing with Josh Groban who I love and is basically the funniest person on the planet. We did a funny skit. And I danced with Terry Crews.
Honestly, I have no idea what the show will entail. It’ll probably be different every show, and it will be completely different than what we plan because that’s usually par for the course in my life. But it’s going to be a little different but definitely inspired by, I love “Ellen,” I love “Oprah,” I love “Jimmy,” I love “Seth,” all those things.
But for me, it’s like our kids are asking us questions that are really heavy, especially with the political nature of what’s happening in society or religion. Our older two start to get really in-depth, and it’s very serious, very worried. So it’s one of those things where I want my show to address situations, but I also want it to be the best form of escapism because I do think that we’re missing that a bit. I feel like everything is very heavy. And while I do think those heavy things need to be addressed, I think that there are certain shows though that are supposed to be a little lighthearted and a little more of the best sides of humanity. Because we’ve got the news for the rest of it, which is depressing.
So how has singing been healing for you?
Oh God. Girl, I don’t know what this says about me psychologically speaking, but I’m never more comfortable singing or on stage, creating. At some point, when I was a child that became my safe haven.
When you’re a kid, and you find something you might be good at that’s where your confidence comes from…that’s not where all my confidence is and lays now as an adult, but it’s definitely where it started. It’s nostalgic, and it’s therapeutic, I think that’s for everyone though not just artists. I have a lot of friends who don’t sing or play anything, and music is one of those kinds of… I traveled the world from a small town.
I come from a small town where it’s very much in a bubble, and everyone’s very similar. Then being on “Idol,” I got to travel the world and see all these different cultures and go to different places. It’s funny because everybody’s oh how different is it? I was, it’s actually funny how everyone’s the same. It’s really interesting. I think we try and point out these differences and it’s great to have culture, and it’s great not lose that, but at the same time, we all want to be happy. We want to be healthy. We all desire to be successful. We want our children to have better lives than us. They’re very simple things that I think we all have in common. — LA, GMA News
