Billy Porter brings his Black Mona Lisa tour to Tempe tonight

Billy Porter is a busy man. The award-winning star of stage, screen, and sound is never without several irons in the fire, and yet he's still making time to go out on tour to build support for his forthcoming album, Black Mona Lisa. (The first single, the nu-disco banger "Baby Was a Dancer," is out now.)

Porter is bringing the tour to ASU Gammage tonight, Sunday, May 7. We caught up with him to get all the details on the show.

Phoenix New Times: What is the impetus for the live shows?
Billy Porter: I’m trying to be a pop star. So I have to go and reach the people. It’s some grassroots shit right now. I gotta go and get in the trenches, honey. That’s how we get people to know who you are. I’m also really excited, because for me, this whole moment, the Black Mona Lisa album and the whole point of it is a celebration of life. It’s a celebration of life, love, hope, peace, joy and my intention is to give the world a big bear hug.

We are inside of a collective trauma still, and none of us are OK. And that’s OK. And we’re trying to be OK. And it’s time to start the process of healing, and we do that together. And I’m excited to be in person, because inside of the collective gathering is where the healing lies. And so my goal is to minister to the people. That is my sole focus. I want people to leave this concert hopeful, encouraged, inspired and called to action. Because we’re in the middle of a very intense fight for the soul of humanity. And I want to be a part of that solution.

What is the significance of the title Black Mona Lisa?
Well, I was writing with Justin Tranter — the magnificent Justin Tranter, one of greatest pop writers of our time, and songwriters in general of our time. We’d been working together for about a year or so, and we were sitting around trying to figure out what to write, and I still can’t recall where Black Mona Lisa came from, so I’m just saying it fell out of the sky, and everybody in the room was like, “Oh my God, this is it,” and then we wrote the song in about 20 minutes. And the significance of it for me, as a 53-year-old pop star, is Mona Lisa is past, present, future, forever. And that is what I aspire to be.

What can people expect when they come to the show?
It’s going to be a retrospective of my life and career. I’m going to do 10 songs from the new album. I’m going to go back to my ’90s R&B days. There’ll be a theater section, there’ll be a political section, there’ll be a gospel section, and then the last like 20, 30 minutes is a dance party, really.

How do you go about creating a show like this?
As of now, I sit and I first figure out the intention, and then I make a list of all the songs that fit inside of that intention. It’s like, “What are the intentions, what are the sections, what’s the arc?” I figure all of that out, and then I write a list of songs and then I just start plugging them and see what sort of works and what may work or not work. So that’s how I put it together. As a storyteller, even though this is a pop concert, there is a flow to it, there is an airiness to it, because I think just naturally, human beings connect better when there’s some sort of narrative involved.

I love the disco vibe of “Baby Was a Dancer.” Why do you think disco is having a renaissance?
Well first of all, disco is now classic. It’s now retro because it’s been long enough. I also think you know, the death of disco happened because of the AIDS crisis. What people are realizing is how healing that time was — how multicultural it was, how much it brought community together. And for me, coming out in 1985 as gay, I was right at the beginning of the AIDS crisis. We went straight to the front lines to fight for our lives and the clubs, even though it wasn’t disco, it was dance/house, the clubs were where we came together to heal. It was our church. And so when I was putting this album together, I knew the base of it throwing back to that time. Because I was able to stay alive during that time with that music, through that music and through community, so I wanted to honor that. And “Baby Was a Dancer” is a part of that honoring.

What are the plans for the full album?
There’s not a date yet but it’s going to be late summer/early fall. This tour is about getting the buzz going and getting people ready for it so I can get some downloads and some streams when it comes out. There’s a strategy.

Between live performances, TV and movies, writing, recording — everything you do — is there one aspect of it that you like best?
No. It’s not a competition. The reason why I do all of the things is because I love all of the things equally. The thing I love the most is what I’m doing in the present moment. What I love right now the most is music, because that’s what I’m doing right now. I love all my babies. I love them all equally, and I feel so blessed that I get to exist in all of these spaces and be a successful multi-hyphenate artist. I really, really love it.

I noticed you're one Oscar short of an EGOT. Do you think about things like that, or are you just like, “I’m going to keep doing what I’m doing, and if it happens, that’s great”?
Both. Yes, and. As an artist, it has to be about the work. It’s always about the work first. So I’m doing this whether I’m getting awards or not. I did it for decades without any recognition or accolades in that way. So it’s always going to be about the work first. Now, I would be lying to you if I said I didn’t care if I got an Oscar or not. I do. So it’s a yes, and.

What else are you working on right now? What’s coming up for you?
Well, it was just announced that I’m going to be playing James Baldwin in a biopic of him. My writing partner and I have been working on a script for that for about a year now. I have a movie coming out this summer that I’m co-starring in with Luke Evans, called Our Son, and it’s like a Kramer v. Kramer meets Marriage Story for an interracial gay couple with an 8-year-old son, so it’s a divorce/child custody movie that ends in hope. So that’s at the Tribeca Film Festival this summer. And I have a production company; we’re trying to sell shows about black queer joy and black excellence. So I have my hands in a lot of pots.

Billy Porter: Black Mona Lisa. 7:30 p.m. Sunday, May 7. ASU Gammage, 1200 South Forest Avenue, Tempe. Cost is $30 to $85. Tickets are available here.