After a decade of striving for success in Hollywood, Billy Eichner nearly decided to leave the entertainment industry behind, but a conversation with Joan Rivers changed his mind.
“The closest I got [to quitting] was back in 2009,” shared the 47-year-old comedian in an exclusive chat with Page Six, while promoting his latest audiobook, “Billy on Billy.”
Just four years prior, Eichner had been the subject of significant buzz, with a glowing feature in the New York Times that led many to believe his career was on the brink of transformation. “Everyone implied that my life was about to change dramatically,” he recalled, noting that agents assured him he would land his own TV show within half a year.
“In reality, they weren’t completely wrong—it just took six years rather than the six months they predicted.”
The former “Billy on the Street” star confessed that during this period, he was plagued by anxiety, fretting over financial stability and the pressure of meeting everyday expenses.
“You can romanticize being a struggling artist in your 20s,” Eichner shared, “but I was 30 [then] and so that wasn’t as cute to me. I had a harder time rationalizing [it], at that point.”
So, he reached out to Joan Rivers, whom he had known for several years and worked with on a failed pilot.
“She invited me to come to dinner and drinks,” Eichner recalled, “and it’s at that dinner where she encouraged me to hold on a little bit longer.” She also told him that he had a “unique energy.”
“I think she really saw something in me and she thought I could make it,” he theorized. “And it truly is the reason I decided to give it another couple of years. And sure enough, that was 2009. In 2010, my first video went viral, and in 2011, ‘Billy on the Street’ became a rising TV show.”
The “AHS” alum isn’t sure what Rivers saw in him.
“Maybe she saw our backgrounds were similar,” he shared. “We were unconventional, we were outrageous. We were from New York City. She obviously loved gay men, and she responded to that part of me. You know, we were Jewish, we love the theater, even though we were trying to carve out our careers.”
Amazingly, Rivers was the first standup comedian Eichner ever saw when his dad snuck him into her performance at the Shore Haven Beach Club when he was eight, “and 20, 25 years later, she became my real champion.”
The “Bros” star said he was happy to include his memories of Rivers, who died in 2014 at age 81, and to honor her.
The surprisingly touching book also honors Eichner’s parents, Debbie and Jay Eichner, who both died before their son’s success and were incredibly supportive of all his endeavors.
Eichner said he’s been moved by people’s reactions to his parents.
“It’s been kind of surreal, in a great way, to watch all of these people who didn’t know my parents, now feeling like they did,” he noted. “And there are so many comments saying, ‘If only every kid were as loved as you were by Jay and Debbie Eichner, the world would be a different place.”