An Interview With Edward Sylvan
I want to open the conversation about boobs in a way that changes priorities and creates new laws. We can’t fight the instinct for males to scan female chests. But A Boob’s Life provides awareness of how America has allowed this to define us, through personal stories readers can relate to and cultural analysis that shows the big picture.
The solution begins with childcare. As long as we consider childcare a luxury at work, or glorified babysitting at home, women cannot catch up with income or status. We cannot influence the media or have fair representation. Even laws for equal pay allow differences due to former salaries, which will always put women who have stepped back to bear our young in a weaker position.
As part of my series about “authors who are making an important social impact”, I had the pleasure of interviewing Leslie Lehr.
From her prize-winning fiction to her viral New York Times Modern Love essay, exploring the challenges facing contemporary women has been author Leslie Lehr’s life-long passion. In her highly praised newly released book, A Boob’s Life: How America’s Obsession Shaped Me — and You, her first project since breast cancer treatment, she continues this mission, taking readers on a wildly informative, deeply personal, and utterly relatable journey. The book has been selected on the must-read lists of Entertainment Tonight, GMA, Glamour, and People and Salma Hayek is turning it into a TV series for HBO Max. Other books written by Leslie include What A Mother Knows, a Target Recommended Read, Wife Goes On, and 66 Laps, winner of the Pirate’s Alley Faulkner Prize. Her nonfiction books include Welcome to Club Mom, Club Grandma, excerpted on FisherPrice.com, and Wendy Bellissimo: Nesting, featured on Oprah. Her personal essays have appeared in the New York Times Modern Love column (narrated by Katie Couric on NPR), HuffPost, Yourtango, and in anthologies Mommy Wars, The Honeymoon’s Over, and On Becoming Fearless. She wrote the original screenplay for the romantic thriller, HEARTLESS, and the comedy-drama, “Club Divorce”, for Lifetime. Lehr is a member of PEN, the Authors Guild, WGA, Women In Film, and the Women’s Leadership Council. She has a BA from the School of Cinematic Arts at USC and an MFA from Antioch. Lehr is a breast cancer survivor, the mother of two daughters, and lives in Southern California.
Thank you so much for joining us in this interview series! Before we dive into the main focus of our interview, our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. Can you tell us a bit about your childhood backstory?
I grew up in Ohio where football was king and cheerleaders in tight sweaters were the queens. Once a year, I stuffed my swimsuit and wore a tinfoil crown to pretend to be Miss America. Breasts were the Holy Grail of beauty. My parents both taught at Ohio State and my mom was on the local board of Planned Parenthood — an early women’s libber. But my dad, who had a collection of leatherbound Playboys on the top bookshelf in the den, was clearly the boss. I was a bookworm who snuck looks at the pictures. My mom was pretty as the pin-ups and smart, but when my dad left for another woman, she was suicidal. Plus, now she was poor, and he was rich. Until then, I was a daddy’s girl, a high achiever who identified with success. So, I thought my mom’s problem was personal and that I could do better. I was wrong.
When you were younger, was there a book that you read that inspired you to take action or changed your life? Can you share a story about that?
A Wrinkle in Time is my favorite book, but it wasn’t until recently that I realized why. As a young girl, I identified with misfit Meg, whose beautiful and brilliant scientist mom worked nonstop to solve the mystery of bringing her husband back home. And Meg was a girl hero! As a mom, I read my dog-eared copy of the book to each of my daughters’ elementary school classes. I embarrassed them horribly because I always cried when Meg shouts, “I love you, Charles Wallace.” This regular girl saved her family and the world. Not with swords or violence, but with love. And author Madeline L’Engle, a woman, made this all up. Now I understand that A Wrinkle in Time taught me about having agency and a voice.
Can you share the funniest or most interesting mistake that occurred to you in the course of your career? What lesson or take away did you learn from that?
Clearly, I’ve made enough funny mistakes for Salma Hayek to be developing A Boob’s Life as a comedy series for HBOMax. But the mistake with the most profound lesson happened when my first child was an infant. My husband and I worked freelance in the film industry (which is the norm), so after Juliette was born, I was unemployed, completely dependent on his income. Late one night, when she was several months old and no longer nursing, I got a call from a commercial producer who needed an emergency replacement the next morning. I’d worked my way up in the business to be line producing, usually for men who would swoop in at the last minute for shoot days, take all the credit, then leave. This was an offer to be a full producer for the full pay. The hours were typically long, but it was only a week or so of work. My husband wasn’t sure of his schedule, so I called childcare agencies all over town and cobbled together daytime help and nighttime help in case I was late. I packed my briefcase, ironed my blazer, and went to bed. I was so excited!
My husband rolled over in bed and said that if anything happened to the baby while I was gone, he would never forgive me. I was so afraid, I couldn’t sleep. At dawn, I called the producer and turned down the job, burning that bridge forever. Had my husband forbid me to take the job, I would have laughed. But the way he said it made it my decision, shaped by guilt. I no longer had any rights beyond motherhood. I was 100% responsible. My body, my very breasts, defined me. This was a trap that was very difficult to escape.
Can you describe how you aim to make a significant social impact with your book?
I want to open the conversation about boobs in a way that changes priorities and creates new laws. We can’t fight the instinct for males to scan female chests. But A Boob’s Life provides awareness of how America has allowed this to define us, through personal stories readers can relate to and cultural analysis that shows the big picture.
The solution begins with childcare. As long as we consider childcare a luxury at work, or glorified babysitting at home, women cannot catch up with income or status. We cannot influence the media or have fair representation. Even laws for equal pay allow differences due to former salaries, which will always put women who have stepped back to bear our young in a weaker position.
Years without social security benefits also force mothers to remain dependent on men, unable to invest, and more likely to be poor when single or retired. The physical and emotional toll of caretaking contributes to diseases such as breast cancer, which has disproportionate loss in communities of color that lack healthcare access. Even our discomfort about breastfeeding in public and the contradictory rules of censorship begin at the breast.
The pandemic exposed this problem in real-time. Even women who could afford childcare or had corporate benefits bowed to the higher earner and left the workforce. Others joined the ranks of lower-paid workers to have the flexibility needed for caregiving. Limiting what mothers can do also puts extra burdens on fathers; everyone suffers. The need for childcare, equal pay, and affordable healthcare cannot be overstated. And self-care sounds so trendy, but it’s life or death for women: we’re doing too much.
It’s a tremendous challenge to overcome the biological requirement to feed and take care of a child. Until we as a society share the challenges of caring for our future generations, we cannot reach our full potential. My book strategy is: come for the boobs, stay to make our lives better.
Can you share with us the most interesting story that you shared in your book?
What surprised me the most is why we are obsessed with breasts. No ever connected the dots before — it’s so prevalent that we take it for granted. But there was a perfect storm of events that happened just before I was born. That makes my life the perfect guide for tracking how it has affected us for generations.
During World War II, Uncle Sam opened childcare centers so women could take over the jobs. At war, pin-up girls were painted on the airplanes to motivate the troops with “bombshell” shaped woman. When the war ended, Uncle Sam closed the daycare centers to get women back home making babies. Large breasts symbolized abundance. Hugh Hefner published the first mainstream magazine full of topless, bountiful “girls-next-door.” Television went from being a novelty to being standard in millions of homes. Television is supported by advertising, so Madison Avenue rose to the call with nubile actresses to draw eyeballs. At the same time, doctors discouraged breastfeeding in favor of newfangled formula. The result: breasts were no longer for babies, they were for men.
What was the “aha moment” or series of events that made you decide to bring your message to the greater world? Can you share a story about that?
One night when I got out of the shower, I noticed my breasts didn’t match. After surviving breast cancer, I was grateful to be alive — but it wasn’t enough. I was furious. It was supposed to be a special date night, but I was desperate to call my doctor. My husband accused me of being obsessed. I was insulted. But was I obsessed? Then a comedian on TV made a boob joke, proving it wasn’t just me. I couldn’t sleep.
Next to my bed was my favorite old photo — of my mom, my one-year-old sister, and three-year-old me — in matching red bikinis. It made me laugh, remembering how important it was to keep our nipples covered. That’s how early I learned that girls’ breasts are special. When a three-year-old knows her nipples are taboo, there are greater forces at work.
I got out of bed and went to my computer to find an answer. There were books about breast cancer and breastfeeding and of course lots of porn, but nothing that put it all together. I could track my whole life by my breasts — wanting them as a girl, hiding them to work, showing them to date, breastfeeding, breast implants, breast cancer… I had to investigate further. Turns out that the way we view breasts, the part of a woman that enters the room first, has influenced both men and women in profound ways.
Without sharing specific names, can you tell us a story about a particular individual who was impacted or helped by your cause?
Just one? My inbox and social media feeds are full of notes from readers of A Boob’s Life. Women are reporting they got mammograms after reading how I’d be dead had I not gotten mine. They are donating to research that saved my life, knowing they could be next. Others thank me for the Book Club Guide that prompts funny stories as well as confessions of domestic abuse. Mothers are writing about late-night conversations with their daughters about breast implants and body image. Sons and husbands are sneaking the book to see photos, then keeping it to read. Universities are inviting me to talk to students in psychology, health, and gender studies.
Some share their stories with me directly, like one who wrote that she got better-bartending tips when she showed cleavage, but when she tried to nurse her baby, she was shamed. One overwhelmed mother thanked me for the prompt to ask her husband to help with dinner, another to take a bubble bath without guilt. Most say they’ve never talked about their breasts before, and are thinking more deeply about their lives. This book has struck a chord that’s becoming a chorus.
Are there three things the community/society/politicians can do to help you address the root of the problem you are trying to solve?
— Politicians can push for free and subsidized public childcare with higher salaried workers as a path to prioritizing the health and financial success of families. In a perfect world, private caregiving would qualify for social security. Both the young and the old need care and we need to value the lives and work of those who provide it. It’s usually women.
— Breastfeeding support in hospitals and in the community would help our children be healthier. It would also take the stigma away and build more respect for mammary glands as a vital life force. A Boob’s Life has a list of breastfeeding facts that will amaze you. It has a list of women who died from breast cancer that will shock you.
— On a psychological level, we need to stop judging women by the size and shape of their breasts. A Boob’s Life has a list of 150 nicknames for breasts that are meant to be funny, but actually, diminish women. It also has statistics about breast augmentation, the most popular elective surgery in the U.S. Media influences generations of Americans to prioritize a very short period of physical development, and these standards spread to the rest of the world. We want to be beautiful, so it’s a double bind. But we can start with being less judgmental of ourselves and each other.
How do you define “Leadership”? Can you explain what you mean or give an example?
As a writer, I’ve learned “show don’t tell” is the most effective means to tell a story. By sharing mine, I’m hoping to lead by example: to gain allies, not followers. We saw with the Women’s March that there is power in numbers, yet the real power is in action. And we need to take action that includes individuals with all colors and shapes of breasts in order to improve life for all of our families, the very building blocks of our nation. If baring my breasts, so to speak, helps change how we think about ourselves and each other, then I am proud to be called a leader.
What are your “5 things I wish someone told me when I first started” and why. Please share a story or example for each.
— Once you have children, everything changes. I didn’t understand how my breasts, my biological ability to nurture, would come to define me.
— Before you marry, have a serious talk about who will care for the children and for how long. And know that you may change your mind. The important thing is for both of you to have say in the conversation and to allow for flexibility. Not only was I swept away with romance, but I believed I could do it all. I was wrong.
— Do not get married until you have financial independence and ideally, savings. Being dependent is dangerous. I normalized bad behavior based on fear.
— Marry a person who will support your career goals whether or not you have children. I started as an executive, but once I became a mother, my career goals changed. The father of my children took pride in paying the mortgage and belittled any work that did not.
— Finally… Don’t be so hard on yourself. We all do the best we can. And when we know better, we do better.
Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?
I am a big fan of the late Wayne Dyer’s Power of Intention. When you believe in something enough, you will take the steps to make it happen. That’s the only way it can happen because ninety percent of success is action. This philosophy helped me re-establish my career after a horrible divorce. It helped me find love. It helped me survive breast cancer. And it helped me believe in this book, A Boob’s Life, enough to make it real so I can share this message with you.
Is there a person in the world, or in the US with whom you would like to have a private breakfast or lunch with, and why? He or she might just see this, especially if we tag them. 🙂
Kamala Harris. She is at the fulcrum of power, with the agency to make change happen. First, I would thank her for being a great role model. Seeing someone with breasts in the White House is such inspiration, even though she hides them from view. I would ask what insights she has in getting to this position that no woman has accomplished before. I would volunteer to be an intellectual resource for talking points to connect the need for childcare as a path for parity, representation, and most other issues that affect women and families today. I would ask what she feels is missing; in what other ways I, and others, can help.
For fun, I’d love to lunch with Dolly Parton. I admire how she has harnessed her boob power for good. She attracts attention then funnels it into good works, from the Imagination Library to standing up for #BlackLivesMatter, to investing in the Moderna vaccine. I have heard interviews about her single-minded work ethic and the business savvy that accompanied her singing and songwriting talent. I might ask if she thinks having enormous breasts helped and whether she would do the same thing if she were starting today. I know she loves her boobs, and I love that about her.
How can our readers further follow your work online?
You can buy my new book here: https://www.amazon.com/Boobs-Life-Americas-Obsession-Shaped/dp/1643136224/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=a+boob%27s+life&qid=1618509216&sr=8-1 and follow me on socials here: @LeslieLehr1
This was very meaningful, thank you so much. We wish you only continued success on your great work!
About The Interviewer: Growing up in Canada, Edward Sylvan was an unlikely candidate to make a mark on the high-powered film industry based in Hollywood. But as CEO of Sycamore Entertainment Group Inc, (SEGI) Sylvan is among a select group of less than ten Black executives who have founded, own and control a publicly traded company. Now, deeply involved in the movie business, he is providing opportunities for people of color.
In 2020, he was appointed president of the Monaco International Film Festival, and was encouraged to take the festival in a new digital direction.
Raised in Toronto, he attended York University where he studied Economics and Political Science, then went to work in finance on Bay Street, (the city’s equivalent of Wall Street). After years of handling equities trading, film tax credits, options trading and mergers and acquisitions for the film, mining and technology industries, in 2008 he decided to reorient his career fully towards the entertainment business.
With the aim of helping Los Angeles filmmakers of color who were struggling to understand how to raise capital, Sylvan wanted to provide them with ways to finance their creative endeavors.
At Sycamore Entertainment he specializes in print and advertising financing, marketing, acquisition and worldwide distribution of quality feature-length motion pictures, and is concerned with acquiring, producing and promoting films about equality, diversity and other thought provoking subject matter which will also include nonviolent storytelling.
Also in 2020, Sylvan launched SEGI TV, a free OTT streaming network built on the pillars of equality, sustainability and community which is scheduled to reach 100 million U.S household televisions and 200 million mobile devices across Roku, Amazon Fire TV, Apple TV, Samsung Smart TV and others.
As Executive Producer he currently has several projects in production including The Trials of Eroy Brown, a story about the prison system and how it operated in Texas, based on the best-selling book, as well as a documentary called The Making of Roll Bounce, about the 2005 coming of age film which starred rapper Bow Wow and portrays roller skating culture in 1970’s Chicago.
He sits on the Board of Directors of Uplay Canada, (United Public Leadership Academy for Youth), which prepares youth to be citizen leaders and provides opportunities for Canadian high school basketball players to advance to Division 1 schools as well as the NBA.
A former competitive go kart racer with Checkered Flag Racing Ltd, he also enjoys traveling to exotic locales. Sylvan resides in Vancouver and has two adult daughters.
Sylvan has been featured in Forbes, the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times and has been seen on Fox Business News, CBS and NBC. Sycamore Entertainment Group Inc is headquartered in Seattle, with offices in Los Angeles and Vancouver.
Social Impact Authors: How & Why Author Leslie Lehr Is Helping To Change Our World was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.