“Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans.”
JOHN LENNON
singer, songwriter, and Beatle
Gene Simmons Family Jewels lasted 167 episodes and seven seasons on the A&E network. (I Love Lucy, generally considered one of the greatest and most successful TV shows of all time, lasted 145 episodes.) We began shooting in 2006 and finished in 2011. We were seen around the world, in eighty-four countries. You can still watch us in reruns everywhere from South Africa to Bulgaria.
Since doing the show, Leslie Greif, the executive producer, has become a major force in television. His Hatfields & McCoys miniseries won three Emmy Awards.
I approached Leslie with the idea of doing a TV special that would show me recording and promoting my solo album. And Greif could also bring a camera crew with KISS as we finally went back on tour to Australia and New Zealand. We also filmed at my home, as I prepared to launch the album with a party at the Key Club in Los Angeles.
At home, the cameras were introduced to Sophie, Nick, and Shannon. Although it wasn’t planned, the camera immediately fell in love with them. When my family was on camera, I became yesterday’s news.
A&E liked the TV special—titled 24/7, in reference to my work ethic—and it did well when it was broadcast, so the network approached me about doing a reality series, although that phrase meant nothing to me at the time. The proposed series would focus on my business ventures and my family. I had never planned for this, and would have never imagined that all of us would ever be interesting enough for public consumption. But there it was, plain as day.
I also never imagined that the show would turn out to be a real diary of my family. Its ups and its downs. Its family values. Although I had never visited a shrink, the show wound up showing me a real reflection of myself. I had always known who I was, but I had never had to confront that person before.
There were great times. There were funny times. And there were some very sad and hurtful times. We traveled around the world. To England. Europe. South America. Canada. We traveled to Africa, where for the first time I met the children I had been financially supporting for twenty-five years in Zambia through the organization ChildFund.
By the time the show was nearing its seventh season, Nick and Sophie were almost grown up, and it became clear that Shannon was finally getting a clear picture of who I was and what I had been—partly through the show.
It was all there, plainly represented on television screens around the world. It was embarrassing. I was ashamed. And I had it coming.
For many years, I had been selfish, arrogant, and delusional about all sorts of things. That same delusional faith in myself that helped me get things done in the business world became a double-edged sword, and put a strain on my relationships with my family. I deluded myself into thinking I could do whatever I wanted outside of our home and family, and that it would never get back to the family or hurt them. I was an idiot.
Shannon was going to leave me because of my ways. I had been unfaithful. I was constantly touring, constantly working. Shannon stayed home and raised the kids. She drove them to school and back every day. She became the school’s lunch president, and negotiated and oversaw the lunch program. In fact, she was there every day, serving lunch to every child in school, so she could keep a close eye on Nick and Sophie. She hovered over them every day to make sure they became ethical, moral human beings. In point of fact, Shannon raised the kids. I just worked.
When things began to leak, we sat down and talked about whether we wanted to be honest with our viewers, and show ourselves as we were, or if we wanted to keep it lighthearted—the safe route, we thought, to keep the show going. We decided that we wanted to show all of it on the series, no matter the consequences. Shannon had had enough fakery in her life—if she was going to be part of a reality show, she wanted to show something truly real, as it was happening. My wandering eye. Shannon’s commitment to the kids. My facelift. Shannon’s heartbreak, when it dawned on her that I had been unfaithful for so many years. We showed my shame. We showed real pain and emotion when Shannon broke down. We filmed Shannon and I going to marriage counselors to try to address my issues. And for some time, Shannon was going to leave me. Both Nick and Sophie were ashamed and hurt by their father: me.
It became clear to me that I was going to lose Shannon and the kids. And that I had to get over myself and finally grow up. Ever since I was a small child, perhaps because my father had left us, I convinced myself I would never get married. And that I would never answer to anyone. Anyone. Not my mother. Not Shannon. Not anyone. I would do as I pleased, the rest of the world be damned.
If you watch the early episodes of our show, that part of me was clear. I wrote books on the subject. If you read my previous autobiography, or my other books, you’ll see a different guy, with different views on this topic. I did interviews on the subject. I went on Oprah and The View and espoused my antimarriage philosophies. And my selfish philosophies. Every time, it hurt Shannon and the kids. And I didn’t care. Delusionally and shamefully, I never thought about it.
But it was becoming clearer and clearer to me that the line in the sand had been drawn, and that I would have to do some fast growing up, or risk throwing it all away. And, because Shannon had too much integrity to lie to the world about it, we decided to film all of that. If the tabloids wanted to talk, we were going to show them first.
I decided to do some real self-analysis. The show arranged for a Marriage Boot Camp. It consisted of a few couples with real issues. The difference was that they were all married and were trying to save their marriages. Shannon and I were never married, and we were trying to figure out how to save our relationship.
One of the exercises, though I was never told about it when I walked into the room, was “What would be the last things I say to my beloved, as she lay in her coffin?” I walked into a room filled with all the other couples, and there was Shannon, lying in a coffin. They asked me to walk up to her, as if she were dead, and talk to her.
It almost seems comical, written out like this. But at the time it was more than I could bear. And it made me really confront my shortcomings. My selfishness. My arrogance. And I was heartbroken at all the pain and suffering I had caused.
We went to Belize. On an idyllic beach, I dropped to my knee and looked up to the person who had stuck by me for twenty-eight years, without ever asking or demanding anything. I tearfully asked Shannon if she would consider marrying a man who was clearly not worthy of her love.
Shannon was in tears, clearly hurt by it all. She was confused, but miraculously said yes.
But the pain and suffering I had brought on Shannon wasn’t over. We had lived together for twenty-eight years with a cohabitation agreement that we had both signed with individual counsel. I was always afraid of the cliché of clichés—that women only want you for your money. Shameful as that may sound, it was true.
Before we got married, I also asked if Shannon would mind doing a prenup, with both of us having our own counsel. That brought on more pain and suffering to Shannon, as each of our lawyers was whispering into our ears about how we had each sacrificed so much, and how the other one should not get what they were asking for. I suppose that’s what your lawyer is supposed to do. But your beloved only winds up getting hurt even more.
We had almost broken up on more than one occasion over the prenup negotiations, but thankfully, they were finally over.
Our wedding date was set, on October 1, 2011—twenty-eight and a half years after we began living together.
The wedding was at the Beverly Hills Hotel.
It was a perfect wedding. It was a beautiful, sunshiny day. Friends and family all were there, as were the other members of KISS: Paul, Tommy, and Eric. So was our dog Snippy. No one threw up. No one passed out. Shannon wrote out her vows and so did I. In front of all the invited guests, I heard Shannon’s beautiful words to me. I was going to read my vows, but then decided to crumple up the paper and just speak from my heart. I told her that I was deeply in love with her. And that she had been the only true love of my life. And that I have a lot to make up for, all the pain and suffering I had caused her and the kids, and that I would do so for the rest of my life.
We kissed, for the first time as husband and wife.
And then the party began. It lasted well into the night. We had a ten-piece big band, fronted by Brenna Whitaker, who rocked it all night. Then KISS got up and played a few songs. And then Nick and Sophie got up and sang a few songs. And then Shannon—surprise—got up and sang in her beautiful voice.
As I write this, we’ve been together more than thirty years. And we have been married to each other for over a year and a half.
Now that the show has stopped filming and I have some distance from it, I believe that our show helped me to confront myself about all sorts of things. As silly as it may sound, that damn reality show actually dug deep. My family. My shortcomings. Our show was also a diary of our kids and our family growing up together. When we first started shooting, Nick and Sophie were preteens. By the time we had finished, they were adults. And Shannon was more beautiful than ever. She still is.
And I’m proud to say she’s my wife.
They say reality shows break up families.
In our case, Gene Simmons Family Jewels forced me to come clean, with the family and with myself.
Gene Simmons Family Jewels saved our family.
The lesson, for business and for life, is to keep your priorities straight. If you come across a zero-sum situation in a business endeavor, you must recognize what you simply cannot live without. I was made to pick from two available paths, and when faced with that, I had to go with the path that led to Shannon. So it is with business—when you take the world by the collar, you must understand why you are doing so. You have to know why it’s worth it. And when you come to a fork in the road, you must keep your eye trained on what is most important to you—whatever that happens to be. Your decision will become clear if you can do this well enough.