WEBVTT - The Oscars Series, Day 4: Spike Lee 0:00:00.800 --> 0:00:04.080 This is Alec Baldwin and you're listening to Here's the Thing. 0:00:04.800 --> 0:00:08.280 It's awards season and we're re listening to some of 0:00:08.280 --> 0:00:12.920 our interviews with Oscar winners. Here's Spike Lee. He won 0:00:13.039 --> 0:00:17.119 his first competitive Oscar last year for the screenplay of 0:00:17.200 --> 0:00:23.880 Black Klansmen. This was thirty years after Do the Right Thing. Everybody, 0:00:23.920 --> 0:00:30.520 welcome Alec Baldwin and Spike Lee. I've been trying to 0:00:30.520 --> 0:00:33.440 get Spike Lee on this program for a long time. 0:00:34.200 --> 0:00:36.880 Finally we made it happen in front of a live 0:00:36.960 --> 0:00:42.000 audience at this year's Trebeca Film Festival. The deal was 0:00:42.159 --> 0:00:45.280 we would each engage the other in a discussion about 0:00:45.320 --> 0:00:48.560 one of our favorite movies of all time. Just listing 0:00:48.720 --> 0:00:52.440 Spike Lee's films should be enough to establish his place 0:00:52.760 --> 0:00:56.080 as one of the deans of American movie making. Do 0:00:56.200 --> 0:01:00.200 the Right Thing, Malcolm X, Jungle Fever, She's gotta of It. 0:01:00.560 --> 0:01:03.360 They defined what it means to be black in America 0:01:03.560 --> 0:01:07.720 and help Spike smash through Hollywood's racial glass ceiling. And 0:01:07.880 --> 0:01:12.200 he's still at it with this year's festival favorite, Black Klansmen, 0:01:12.560 --> 0:01:16.160 in which I make an appearance alongside stars John David 0:01:16.200 --> 0:01:20.839 Washington and Adam Driver and now our conversation at Spring 0:01:20.920 --> 0:01:24.640 Studios in New York as part of the Rebeca Film Festival. 0:01:25.200 --> 0:01:28.360 We didn't rehearse any of this. First of all, let 0:01:28.360 --> 0:01:30.679 me just explain to you what a pain in the 0:01:30.760 --> 0:01:32.880 acid is. To get him on the phone. It is 0:01:32.920 --> 0:01:37.479 so painful. Pull him and text him and text him 0:01:38.600 --> 0:01:41.039 really sunny. He calls me back like six music. What's up? 0:01:43.200 --> 0:01:46.440 If I see a number on my phone, I don't 0:01:46.440 --> 0:01:51.080 know the number, I don't pick up and he has 0:01:51.120 --> 0:01:56.320 four numbers. Tell me. I mean what I want to 0:01:56.360 --> 0:02:00.360 know first is because I think this is helps you know, 0:02:00.360 --> 0:02:03.520 these kinds of origins help us understand this kind of 0:02:03.560 --> 0:02:07.280 film appreciation. What was movie going in your life when 0:02:07.320 --> 0:02:09.400 you were young, when you were a child, tell us 0:02:09.560 --> 0:02:12.240 where you grew up, what kind of household you grew 0:02:12.320 --> 0:02:14.960 up in, and what was the whole TV movie dynamic 0:02:15.000 --> 0:02:17.120 in terms of your consumption of that kind of stuff 0:02:17.160 --> 0:02:18.959 when you were a child. I even I never knew 0:02:18.960 --> 0:02:21.280 that you could even make a film growing up. I 0:02:21.320 --> 0:02:25.840 grew up in the Republic of Brooklyn. We were the 0:02:25.919 --> 0:02:28.600 first black family to move into cobble Hill, which is 0:02:28.639 --> 0:02:32.680 a predominant town in American Navy because cobbles right by 0:02:32.720 --> 0:02:38.360 the docks, and the docks were Italian American, and uh, 0:02:38.560 --> 0:02:41.320 we got called nigga a couple of times first week. 0:02:41.400 --> 0:02:45.000 But once my friends sold them, weren't a hundred of 0:02:45.000 --> 0:02:48.120 other black families moved in behind me. Then we were 0:02:48.200 --> 0:02:50.120 just cool after that. So none after that, and then 0:02:50.120 --> 0:02:54.280 we my mother decide we gotta stop paying rents, so 0:02:54.320 --> 0:02:57.720 we bought a brown still a fourth Green, for forty 0:02:57.800 --> 0:03:03.639 five thousand dollars. They go for four million. Now what 0:03:04.040 --> 0:03:07.200 year was up? Sixty eight? My father grew up in 0:03:07.200 --> 0:03:11.720 four Queen on St. James's Place in Fulton's So I 0:03:11.840 --> 0:03:17.080 remember you now you're a pain in the ask then too, 0:03:17.800 --> 0:03:19.480 I couldn't get you on the phone back in sixty 0:03:19.560 --> 0:03:25.680 eight either you were in four Green and sixty eight 0:03:27.440 --> 0:03:31.080 because white flight had happened by then, people will move 0:03:31.160 --> 0:03:38.440 to Long Island. But what's the first movie you saw 0:03:38.480 --> 0:03:42.480 on the big screen? The first movie I can remember, 0:03:42.600 --> 0:03:46.160 my mother took me to see really quick. My father 0:03:46.280 --> 0:03:49.680 hated movies, but he loves sports. I got my love 0:03:49.720 --> 0:03:53.880 of sports from my father. My mother loves movies, but 0:03:53.920 --> 0:03:56.240 my since my father hated movies, I was my mother's 0:03:56.520 --> 0:04:00.680 movie date. The first film I can remember my mother 0:04:00.720 --> 0:04:02.640 took my late mother take me to. She took me 0:04:02.880 --> 0:04:09.600 for Eastern Sunday raistic musical. So Bye Bye Birdie. And 0:04:09.640 --> 0:04:12.880 here's the thing though, that film impact me so much 0:04:12.920 --> 0:04:15.520 I even know it. The opening credit sequence will do 0:04:15.600 --> 0:04:18.760 the right thing, Rosie pres dancing. That came from Bye 0:04:18.800 --> 0:04:23.359 Bye Birdie and Margaret. That's where it came from. And 0:04:23.560 --> 0:04:26.400 I mustn't. I must have been like seven eight years old, 0:04:26.839 --> 0:04:30.560 but it just came out of nowhere? Did I mean? 0:04:30.640 --> 0:04:32.560 This is a cliche, I guess, But did that do 0:04:32.680 --> 0:04:34.320 something to you the first time you saw a movie 0:04:34.320 --> 0:04:37.520 on a big screen? Did you sit there and go yeah? 0:04:37.560 --> 0:04:41.599 But I didn't want them. It's not like at that moment, 0:04:43.480 --> 0:04:45.800 but it was not who who? Who makes a movie? 0:04:47.360 --> 0:04:50.760 So growing up, I wanted to play a second base 0:04:50.839 --> 0:04:53.840 for New York Mets, but genetics conspired against that happening. 0:04:54.760 --> 0:04:57.520 That's where I changed over to the Yankees. But anyway, 0:04:59.560 --> 0:05:02.320 I want to to be a porn star, but against 0:05:02.360 --> 0:05:08.720 that too, So I'm I grew up wanted to be 0:05:09.680 --> 0:05:12.800 a filmmaker. But I remember my mother taking me to 0:05:12.839 --> 0:05:17.360 see uh Main Streets when Bunny and Clyde came out. 0:05:19.160 --> 0:05:21.440 I said, can I go? She said, I'm not taking you. 0:05:22.640 --> 0:05:25.279 I went to see Buying Clyde. I had nightmares for 0:05:25.760 --> 0:05:28.800 two weeks because I mean, up to that point there 0:05:28.880 --> 0:05:32.279 was never violent shown like that, and that that shook 0:05:32.320 --> 0:05:38.080 me for two weeks was groundbreaking the Penn. But the 0:05:38.120 --> 0:05:42.000 reason why I chose On the Ward from besides is 0:05:42.120 --> 0:05:44.760 one of the greatest films ever, is because I became 0:05:44.880 --> 0:05:48.560 very friendly with Bud Schilberg, the great Great Bud Show. 0:05:52.240 --> 0:05:57.599 I called him up. You know, back then, you called 0:05:57.640 --> 0:06:03.479 people up. I called Stanly Dining up, Colcazan up. You 0:06:03.560 --> 0:06:05.600 get people on the phone. People don't realize how much 0:06:05.640 --> 0:06:08.200 that happens in this business. And you know, I was 0:06:08.240 --> 0:06:11.279 a young filmmaker, so you know. And and in fact, 0:06:12.040 --> 0:06:15.240 I called Billy Waller up. He said, come on over. 0:06:15.560 --> 0:06:17.960 And Craig and I had anything my go at people. 0:06:17.960 --> 0:06:19.760 I got my posters too, So I got my postes, 0:06:20.520 --> 0:06:24.720 you know, just the the sign but both But But 0:06:24.920 --> 0:06:27.400 and I we worked on the script together, and but 0:06:27.680 --> 0:06:33.919 lived to be ninety four or five. But when he 0:06:34.000 --> 0:06:38.400 was ninety we wrote a script together called Say's Joe 0:06:38.480 --> 0:06:41.400 Lewis about this relationship. Between Joe Louis and Max Schmollen 0:06:43.080 --> 0:06:45.159 and his in In the last two years of life. 0:06:45.200 --> 0:06:47.120 He would call me every week and say, Spike, did 0:06:47.120 --> 0:06:50.120 you get the money yet? Did you get the money yet? 0:06:50.120 --> 0:06:51.720 Because I had promised him that I was gonna make 0:06:51.720 --> 0:06:54.479 this film before we passed. I'm gonna make that promise happen. 0:06:55.080 --> 0:06:57.080 But we just couldn't get together up. But it's amazing 0:06:57.080 --> 0:07:02.120 as an epic has Hitler Girl Rules f dr on 0:07:02.160 --> 0:07:07.920 the Roosevelt, lenel Horn, Joe Louis, Max s mellon Shore, 0:07:07.960 --> 0:07:11.440 the Ray Robinson. I mean, it's it's uh, let me 0:07:11.440 --> 0:07:13.400 get it done one day. You know. I'm missing now 0:07:13.480 --> 0:07:15.960 when you when you talk about it in the same 0:07:16.600 --> 0:07:19.200 as in my life where I would watch movies and 0:07:19.200 --> 0:07:22.880 I thought that movie stars were harvested on another planet 0:07:22.920 --> 0:07:24.640 and they flew them down here or something, you know. 0:07:24.680 --> 0:07:28.120 I I the idea that myself or anybody like me 0:07:28.200 --> 0:07:30.440 could get into the movie business was just absurd, you 0:07:30.480 --> 0:07:33.160 know to me. And when did that change for you? 0:07:33.200 --> 0:07:36.800 Meaning when did moviemaking become a direction that you wanted 0:07:36.840 --> 0:07:39.040 to set sailing? Oh? When I went to college and 0:07:39.080 --> 0:07:42.360 went to Morouse College in Atlanta, Georgia and my first 0:07:42.440 --> 0:07:47.240 two years the house. My first two years, I was 0:07:49.840 --> 0:07:55.679 the C plus D minor student. What was your major? 0:07:56.240 --> 0:07:58.680 I didn't have a major at that point, and so 0:07:59.080 --> 0:08:03.160 before second semester ended, the ended. In my souphomayen, it's 0:08:03.160 --> 0:08:05.360 trying to go back to New York. But if some 0:08:05.480 --> 0:08:07.560 of my advisor told him we had to choose a 0:08:07.640 --> 0:08:10.800 major when I come back in the fall, And I 0:08:10.880 --> 0:08:14.120 said why and my advisors said, because you have exhausted 0:08:14.120 --> 0:08:19.240 all your electives. So I came back to New York 0:08:19.520 --> 0:08:21.560 and it was a summer ninth. There was an infamous 0:08:21.560 --> 0:08:27.040 summer nineteen seventy seven. The Yankees won the World Series. 0:08:27.320 --> 0:08:31.880 The first summer disco heat was horrible. Therefore you had 0:08:31.920 --> 0:08:38.000 the blackout and you had David Berker. It's not the 0:08:38.120 --> 0:08:43.000 stand so it's amazing. Many minutes later I wrote the 0:08:43.040 --> 0:08:47.480 Corona Script with the Michael Creole and Victor Clochio called 0:08:47.520 --> 0:08:52.400 the Summer sam But anyway, New York City was broke 0:08:52.520 --> 0:08:55.640 that summer. There's a famous Daily News front page forward 0:08:55.640 --> 0:09:00.800 to New York dropped dead. There you go. You up 0:09:00.800 --> 0:09:03.440 to that point, if you had your workers permit, you 0:09:03.520 --> 0:09:06.680 get the job doing something. But there were no jobs 0:09:06.679 --> 0:09:09.880 in New York City and I and I didn't want 0:09:09.880 --> 0:09:12.360 to spend the whole summer playing strata matic baseball on 0:09:12.440 --> 0:09:17.160 my stoop. So as a still my friend today. Her 0:09:17.200 --> 0:09:19.240 name is if you had to Johnston. She was very smart. 0:09:19.360 --> 0:09:21.240 She if you go to Stifers and you had to 0:09:21.240 --> 0:09:25.000 be smart. The test for New York City was Brooklyn Tech, 0:09:25.760 --> 0:09:29.960 Science and Stuyverson. Brooklyn Tech was it might down the 0:09:29.960 --> 0:09:34.559 block for me here science and stops. She got in 0:09:34.679 --> 0:09:38.600 the I mean she was smart. So one day and 0:09:38.760 --> 0:09:41.720 I swear my mother's grave this this was not a mistake. 0:09:42.920 --> 0:09:46.360 I was sitting on my stoop nothing to do, and 0:09:46.400 --> 0:09:50.400 the spirit told me and got cit Vieta. So I 0:09:50.440 --> 0:09:56.200 went to her house. She lived at University Towers on Waverley, No, Willoughby, 0:09:56.280 --> 0:10:00.360 and uh will it will it be in Asheville Cross 0:10:00.400 --> 0:10:04.200 Street from l I U. So she's studying, I mean 0:10:04.360 --> 0:10:07.040 she's studying the whole summer. And so there's a box 0:10:07.400 --> 0:10:10.439 in the corner of the room. And I said, what's that. 0:10:10.600 --> 0:10:13.599 She said, that's a super eight camera. You can have it. 0:10:14.480 --> 0:10:18.200 I said, was another box? She said, that's the stupid 0:10:18.280 --> 0:10:20.640 that's the cartridge of the super eight that goes into 0:10:20.679 --> 0:10:22.880 the thing says you can have it. I'm gonna be 0:10:22.960 --> 0:10:26.520 a doctor, so I don't need this. She is a 0:10:26.600 --> 0:10:29.400 doctor now. She went to Princeton undergrad and with the 0:10:29.440 --> 0:10:34.760 halready med school. So that was not a mistake for 0:10:34.920 --> 0:10:37.520 me to go VI at his house that day. So 0:10:39.000 --> 0:10:41.559 now it had so now there's something to do. So 0:10:41.640 --> 0:10:45.199 I spent the whole summer not trying to be a filmmaker, 0:10:45.280 --> 0:10:48.719 but just shooting stuff. So I shot the Blackout. It 0:10:48.840 --> 0:10:51.840 was the first summer discos. Every weekend there's a block 0:10:51.920 --> 0:10:56.440 part in DJs will hook them their turntables and speakers 0:10:56.480 --> 0:10:59.439 to the thing and then uh, it was just a 0:10:59.520 --> 0:11:02.679 crazy him. So I came back to school in the 0:11:02.800 --> 0:11:05.599 fall and declared my major's being a mask municse is 0:11:05.640 --> 0:11:08.360 a major. Now more House didn't have that major, so 0:11:08.480 --> 0:11:12.680 I so I took mastercations across the street at Clark College. 0:11:13.360 --> 0:11:17.000 So you had Spellman, Morehouse, Clark College, Atlanta University, and 0:11:17.080 --> 0:11:20.280 Morris Brown these all black institutions really in the same 0:11:20.360 --> 0:11:24.280 mary in Atlanta. And there's a teacher. There's there's a professor, 0:11:24.360 --> 0:11:28.120 his name is Dr Herbiker Burger, still teaching there and 0:11:28.200 --> 0:11:32.080 I told him I had this film I just shot 0:11:32.160 --> 0:11:33.600 from footage. I don't know what to do with. They said, 0:11:33.600 --> 0:11:35.439 you make up feel with it, so mass much case 0:11:35.559 --> 0:11:43.520 is quickly with film, TV, journalism and broadcast, and he said, 0:11:44.480 --> 0:11:47.200 make a documentary. To make a documentary of the film. 0:11:47.280 --> 0:11:50.840 The film end up being called Last House in Brooklyn. 0:11:51.520 --> 0:11:54.680 I worked all semester on it, and then many times 0:11:55.640 --> 0:11:58.320 when he had he had the key to the film lab, 0:11:59.840 --> 0:12:04.160 and twice a week he would stay extra. So I 0:12:04.200 --> 0:12:06.400 guess spent another four hours edited and he wasn't getting 0:12:06.400 --> 0:12:09.120 paid for it either. Extra. Why do you think he 0:12:09.200 --> 0:12:11.880 did that? He saw some mammy I didn't see right. 0:12:12.360 --> 0:12:14.200 What did he see in you that you didn't see? 0:12:18.040 --> 0:12:20.960 I don't know. I never asked him that teaches are 0:12:21.000 --> 0:12:23.679 so important. I mean, I think you're going to somebody 0:12:23.800 --> 0:12:30.840 giving you a hand. Explain that, by the way, because 0:12:30.840 --> 0:12:32.800 I mean, I don't want to just kiss your butt 0:12:32.840 --> 0:12:34.480 here all day, all night long, but because that's very 0:12:34.480 --> 0:12:36.400 easy to do. I mean, let's listen, I'm gonna get 0:12:36.440 --> 0:12:38.920 I don't wanna get emotional here. But like in this business, 0:12:39.559 --> 0:12:41.400 there's just something. I mean, you look at people who 0:12:41.440 --> 0:12:44.360 are talented, and you really, it just it humbles you, 0:12:45.040 --> 0:12:47.480 it quiets you. You know, this man is one of 0:12:47.520 --> 0:12:50.360 the greatest movie makers of the last fifty or seventy 0:12:50.440 --> 0:12:52.800 five years. In this kind thank you, thank you, expends 0:12:52.800 --> 0:12:56.839 one of the greatest filmmakers alive. Thank you ever. And 0:12:57.040 --> 0:13:00.240 so when you that mentorship thing, to explain it people, 0:13:00.240 --> 0:13:02.800 which even was news to me up until recently. You 0:13:02.880 --> 0:13:05.720 don't guest teach. You're on the faculty. You teacher course 0:13:06.200 --> 0:13:08.480 every year for how many years now going on five 0:13:08.520 --> 0:13:14.199 team years. I'm a tenure film professor. You're gonna get 0:13:14.200 --> 0:13:17.040 a paid check man, fantastic, No, he had paid now. 0:13:17.200 --> 0:13:21.520 But the thing is that both my children went to 0:13:21.640 --> 0:13:27.719 n y U, so that tuition ain't no joke. But 0:13:28.559 --> 0:13:32.000 my mother was a teacher, my late mother, she taught 0:13:32.080 --> 0:13:35.439 us Saint Ann's and broken heights on the legendary seven balls. 0:13:36.440 --> 0:13:43.319 None of my grandmother taught My grandmother's grandma was a slave. Yes, 0:13:43.400 --> 0:13:47.280 she graduated from Spellman. My mother, my mother graduated from Spellman, 0:13:47.600 --> 0:13:51.040 My grandmother graduated Spellman, my father and grand my father 0:13:51.120 --> 0:13:55.000 and grandfather graduated from Warhouse. My father's a freshman Dr 0:13:55.080 --> 0:13:57.439 Market came was a senior Martin became the third and 0:13:57.480 --> 0:14:01.280 our classmates the class seventy nine. But my grandmother taught 0:14:01.960 --> 0:14:05.800 art the fifty years in Atlanta, George and fifty years 0:14:06.080 --> 0:14:08.880 she never had one white student because of the Jim 0:14:08.960 --> 0:14:12.400 Crow laws and and and in the South, specifically in 0:14:12.440 --> 0:14:15.880 Atlanta and the fifty years, white students missed on the 0:14:16.040 --> 0:14:20.240 great art teacher. And my mother, my grandmother fifty years 0:14:20.320 --> 0:14:25.400 saved their social Security checks for grandchildren education. So since 0:14:25.440 --> 0:14:29.520 that was the first grandchild, she put me through more 0:14:29.560 --> 0:14:33.920 house and n y U just accumulation of the Social 0:14:33.920 --> 0:14:39.320 Security checks over fifty years. M and she gave me 0:14:39.400 --> 0:14:43.880 the seed money for my my thesis film, Joe's bestse Barbershop. 0:14:44.000 --> 0:14:46.720 We cult head one which wanted student Cammy Ward and 0:14:47.040 --> 0:14:48.600 a little bit money for us. She's gonna have it 0:14:48.680 --> 0:14:51.880 the first film. But but even more important than the money, 0:14:52.280 --> 0:14:54.040 and we gotta go, we gotta talk about the films, 0:14:54.080 --> 0:14:58.840 even more important. And here's the thing, though, here's what 0:14:58.920 --> 0:15:01.200 I say when I when I in public, I always 0:15:01.240 --> 0:15:06.640 say this, parents kill more dreams than anybody, so just 0:15:06.720 --> 0:15:10.720 specifically if those dreams that their children have had to 0:15:10.800 --> 0:15:15.760 do with the arts. So I grew up in a 0:15:15.960 --> 0:15:19.120 very artistic family. So when I said my tory, but 0:15:19.200 --> 0:15:22.240 I wanted to be a filmmaker, nobody said, get the 0:15:22.240 --> 0:15:25.160 funk out of you're crazy. No black filmmakers. You know, 0:15:25.360 --> 0:15:28.520 Melvin was not around anymore. I wasn't making films Ozzie Daves, 0:15:28.560 --> 0:15:31.120 Oscar Show, Oscar Showman Dead for many of me the years. 0:15:31.680 --> 0:15:37.640 But I only got encouragement. And so often when a 0:15:37.840 --> 0:15:41.400 child a young adult tells their parents, you know what, 0:15:41.560 --> 0:15:47.960 what are you gonna make? Dream? Poetry, ballet, dance, photography, 0:15:48.080 --> 0:15:52.080 whatever it is, they're like now their black parents goes 0:15:52.200 --> 0:15:56.280 like this, as long as your monkey has as black 0:15:57.560 --> 0:16:01.920 living in my house? Where am I clothes? Eat my food? 0:16:04.400 --> 0:16:06.360 We we did. We didn't take out a second more 0:16:06.400 --> 0:16:09.640 to go to house. And I mean they got some points, 0:16:09.720 --> 0:16:11.840 you know, in my house that played out like this. 0:16:12.240 --> 0:16:15.320 I'm going to GW to study political science. I go 0:16:15.440 --> 0:16:17.640 up to New York. Long story, but I go my 0:16:17.720 --> 0:16:20.720 audition for the acting program and I get accepted, and 0:16:20.760 --> 0:16:22.520 I'm going to go to the n y U Acting program. 0:16:22.560 --> 0:16:25.560 And I explained to my parents how it's actually gonna 0:16:25.640 --> 0:16:28.240 cost less for me to go to n y U, 0:16:28.280 --> 0:16:31.200 even though it's more expensive school because I requalified for 0:16:31.240 --> 0:16:35.320 all this New York state based loans and scholarships, region scholarship, 0:16:35.360 --> 0:16:37.480 things that I forfeited when I went to Washington. So 0:16:37.520 --> 0:16:40.200 I called my family and I say, I'm gonna leave 0:16:40.360 --> 0:16:42.160 g W. I'm not gonna go to law school. I'm 0:16:42.160 --> 0:16:43.840 gonna go to n y U and study acting. And 0:16:43.960 --> 0:16:46.480 my mother, I means, she screamed like a heart, like 0:16:46.640 --> 0:16:48.920 like like Jamie Lee Curtis in a horror movie. She 0:16:49.120 --> 0:16:50.400 was like. My mother was like, are you out of 0:16:50.480 --> 0:16:54.520 your insane? She's screaming, and I go, no, no, I 0:16:54.680 --> 0:16:56.720 go listen. I go, it's gonna cost you guys less money. 0:16:56.840 --> 0:16:58.560 And my father, let's hear him out. Let's hear him 0:16:58.600 --> 0:17:07.280 out here about director Spike Lee. He also teaches in 0:17:07.359 --> 0:17:10.560 the graduate film program at n y U. And when 0:17:10.680 --> 0:17:14.240 we return, we'll do some analysis on our chosen films. 0:17:14.640 --> 0:17:26.800 A place in the sun and on the waterfront. I'm 0:17:26.840 --> 0:17:30.520 Alec Baldwin and you're listening to here's the thing now, 0:17:30.720 --> 0:17:33.600 more of my conversation in front of a live audience 0:17:33.920 --> 0:17:38.080 at the Rebeca Film Festival with director Spike Lee. Your 0:17:38.200 --> 0:17:41.159 films obviously deal with a lot of themes of racial 0:17:41.240 --> 0:17:44.639 injustice and so forth and struggle are themes that are 0:17:44.720 --> 0:17:48.720 in your own films? Are they in Waterfront as well? Yeah? 0:17:49.040 --> 0:17:53.480 Amazon Anderson Cooper. When this whole thing was Happenel Kaepernick 0:17:55.000 --> 0:17:56.960 and I watched on a Ward from again for the 0:17:57.000 --> 0:18:00.840 million times, and the stuff that Nick was saying with 0:18:00.960 --> 0:18:05.359 the same stuff that did. Marlon Brando was saying, I 0:18:05.520 --> 0:18:11.480 want my rights. And you can see the mob who's 0:18:11.480 --> 0:18:14.399 an NFL owner, because you have when you have the 0:18:14.480 --> 0:18:18.160 shape up. He had the things that guy was giving 0:18:18.200 --> 0:18:24.080 out and here here's the motherfucker here in the scene 0:18:24.960 --> 0:18:27.720 to get under work the guy, the steward, whatever he 0:18:27.760 --> 0:18:31.480 has to give you, like a coin. And so after 0:18:31.760 --> 0:18:37.240 Marlon Brando, Terry Malloyd testifies against Lee J. Cobb friend 0:18:37.359 --> 0:18:41.320 Johnny Friendly, he he says, fuck it, I'm going back 0:18:41.359 --> 0:18:46.040 to work. So we standing there and they're giving out 0:18:46.080 --> 0:18:50.280 a coin to everybody, and then there's nobody there and 0:18:50.359 --> 0:18:55.640 there's some rummy, some bump who's has his hands over 0:18:56.160 --> 0:19:01.600 there and he put in it's so I'm saying, the NFL, 0:19:01.840 --> 0:19:07.040 these motherfucker's higher montherfucking quarterbacks who were horrible. So what 0:19:07.200 --> 0:19:10.360 they did the TERMINI they were doing the Kaepernick. They 0:19:10.400 --> 0:19:12.480 were I don't want to say the guy's name. The 0:19:12.520 --> 0:19:17.440 guy had retired Chicago Bears quarterback. Go ahead say his 0:19:17.600 --> 0:19:23.000 name here. They took him my retirement, gave him a 0:19:23.080 --> 0:19:27.480 ten million dollar contract. He was horrible, and Kaepernick still 0:19:27.560 --> 0:19:32.720 can't get a job. So it was amazing. I mean, 0:19:32.960 --> 0:19:37.480 but Schilberg was a visionary, and when I saw what 0:19:37.680 --> 0:19:39.720 they were doing, the term malloy was the same thing 0:19:40.119 --> 0:19:44.760 that was doing the Kaepernick. I think that there's a 0:19:44.840 --> 0:19:47.560 lot of legend and lore about that film, and you know, 0:19:47.920 --> 0:19:51.600 these stories of everybody's heard a million times about Brando 0:19:51.680 --> 0:19:55.520 doesn't do the off camera for Er and all that crap, 0:19:55.600 --> 0:19:56.879 and you know, all that stuff which is not that 0:19:56.960 --> 0:20:01.320 important is the movie about because ends mea culpa for 0:20:01.560 --> 0:20:04.600 you know, ratting him. I'm glad what I've done to you, 0:20:04.760 --> 0:20:07.040 John Friendly, I'm gonna keep on doing it, he says, 0:20:07.119 --> 0:20:09.560 you know, you know that that no apologies for that. 0:20:09.960 --> 0:20:12.240 But for me, it's like, uh, you know, Brandon was 0:20:12.320 --> 0:20:16.000 someone who was did you know, Yeah, I met Brandon 0:20:16.080 --> 0:20:18.920 one time. I was gonna do I was in this 0:20:19.119 --> 0:20:22.960 wheel of my life where c you know, CBS was 0:20:22.960 --> 0:20:25.400 gonna pay people big money to do these m ow's 0:20:25.400 --> 0:20:27.439 the old m o W we're gonna do? We did. 0:20:27.520 --> 0:20:29.439 I did street Car on Broadway, which we wound up 0:20:29.480 --> 0:20:33.520 doing on uh for TV. No no, no, no, no that, 0:20:33.680 --> 0:20:35.119 but we do we do a street Car and bro 0:20:35.240 --> 0:20:36.840 we were on TV. But that was a waste of time. 0:20:36.880 --> 0:20:38.840 But they paid everybody a lot of money. But like, 0:20:38.960 --> 0:20:40.560 why do it from TV when it's in the in 0:20:40.640 --> 0:20:43.159 the movie? His movie? And so I go see him 0:20:43.160 --> 0:20:45.000 because they want to do Canton a huntin Roof and 0:20:45.040 --> 0:20:46.520 they want him to play Big Daddy, but they're not 0:20:46.560 --> 0:20:48.639 going to insure him. Long story short, as I go 0:20:48.760 --> 0:20:50.320 to his house, there's a true story. I go to 0:20:50.440 --> 0:20:53.040 his house up on Mulholland and I go there to 0:20:53.160 --> 0:20:56.160 beg him to do Cottas and Roof if they will 0:20:56.320 --> 0:20:59.000 ultimately insure, which they wouldn't. And I mean, I'll do 0:20:59.119 --> 0:21:02.840 my my my tepid, brand new impersonation. But I said, uh, 0:21:03.480 --> 0:21:07.320 I said, uh, you know, I you know one thing 0:21:07.400 --> 0:21:08.639 led to whatever. I had lunch with her for four 0:21:08.720 --> 0:21:11.639 hours and I said, uh, uh, you know, I did 0:21:11.720 --> 0:21:14.280 Streetcar on Broadway. Uh, like it was like six or 0:21:14.320 --> 0:21:17.200 seven years before. And then yeah, I heard about that 0:21:17.359 --> 0:21:20.480 from some friends of mine that you did that. I 0:21:20.600 --> 0:21:23.560 heard you were very little, not yes, and I heard 0:21:23.600 --> 0:21:27.440 you were very funny, and I wish I had done 0:21:27.600 --> 0:21:29.879 more of that because it's a very funny part, and 0:21:30.160 --> 0:21:33.280 the character of Stanley is very funny, and I wish 0:21:33.280 --> 0:21:35.480 I had found more of the humor myself. And there's 0:21:35.480 --> 0:21:37.960 a pause, and I went, but it worked out pretty 0:21:37.960 --> 0:21:39.280 well for you just to say it, don't you say, 0:21:39.920 --> 0:21:43.760 I mean, I mean, I mean it went okay. Don't 0:21:43.760 --> 0:21:46.080 you think how it went over, you know, in the 0:21:46.160 --> 0:21:49.800 for the public, and uh, but it's uh, yeah, I 0:21:49.840 --> 0:21:51.760 met him just that one time. And uh but but 0:21:52.160 --> 0:21:55.000 you see, he's interesting to me because there's a couple 0:21:55.000 --> 0:21:57.639 of guys. I mean, I'm gonna talk briefly about it 0:21:57.680 --> 0:22:00.200 from the actor's standpoint, which which I can't out, but 0:22:00.600 --> 0:22:02.879 you know, but Sheina was obviously a big beacon for me. 0:22:02.960 --> 0:22:06.680 And there's those moments. There's always a moment, uh, you know, 0:22:07.119 --> 0:22:10.280 John Mandolph was in the hospital and Serprico has got 0:22:10.320 --> 0:22:13.240 the bullet hole in his face. Uh, and John Mandolf 0:22:13.280 --> 0:22:15.240 puts the gold Shield on him and he doesn't want 0:22:15.480 --> 0:22:18.159 the gold Shield to become a detective. And finally he 0:22:18.200 --> 0:22:21.280 gets it in Macino. Just he erupts into this moment, 0:22:21.400 --> 0:22:25.240 this momentary sob this gasp of agony for just a 0:22:25.359 --> 0:22:28.440 moment of his suffering. And I just thought to myself, 0:22:28.720 --> 0:22:30.399 this is why I want al maybe want to be 0:22:30.440 --> 0:22:32.760 an actor as much as anybody, as much as anybody, 0:22:33.080 --> 0:22:37.200 but Gina was the one that maybe want. He was 0:22:37.240 --> 0:22:39.960 one of them, you know, Yead dog Day Surprico was 0:22:40.000 --> 0:22:42.680 one of my favorites. But and Brando to But Brando 0:22:42.800 --> 0:22:46.600 of course gets into that zone where he doesn't care. 0:22:46.800 --> 0:22:48.520 You know, he's a prodigy, and he puts all the 0:22:48.520 --> 0:22:51.080 pieces together when he's twenty four years old. Brando did 0:22:51.160 --> 0:22:52.840 Street Car and Brodery when it was twenty four. I 0:22:52.880 --> 0:22:57.080 did it when I was thirty four. He I never 0:22:57.200 --> 0:22:59.359 met him. You never did call me up two o'clock 0:22:59.400 --> 0:23:06.440 in the morning and uh, I'm not gonna do imitational. 0:23:06.600 --> 0:23:09.639 But he wanted me to do a film about Native Americans. 0:23:12.119 --> 0:23:16.640 And I've never heard from after that. Well, well, he yeah, 0:23:16.720 --> 0:23:18.840 and then I found lady. He would call people late, 0:23:19.520 --> 0:23:21.840 but Tibody got my number and I unbelieve it was 0:23:21.920 --> 0:23:23.800 him at first. But my favorite line he said to 0:23:23.840 --> 0:23:26.040 me was I sit in his house and I'm terrified 0:23:26.080 --> 0:23:28.919 with him. I'm terrified, terrified. I meet people who are 0:23:28.960 --> 0:23:32.119 my peers, you know, and my generation of actors, and 0:23:32.359 --> 0:23:35.480 I admire some of them incredibly, but it's different when 0:23:35.480 --> 0:23:37.600 you meet Kirk Douglas or Gregory Peck and some of 0:23:37.640 --> 0:23:38.920 these guys I met. I mean, I was like, I 0:23:39.000 --> 0:23:41.520 literally pissed my pants when I met Gregory Peck and 0:23:41.760 --> 0:23:45.480 uh like almost literally and uh um and then I'll 0:23:45.480 --> 0:23:47.240 never forget. I'm in Brando's house and he said to me, 0:23:47.280 --> 0:23:49.919 he says, he says, you know, you and I are 0:23:50.040 --> 0:23:58.080 like two dogs that are sniffing each other. He said, 0:23:58.240 --> 0:24:02.960 You're sniffing me and I'm sniffing you. And he said, 0:24:03.359 --> 0:24:06.000 and oh god, oh god, I hate that. I hate that. 0:24:06.640 --> 0:24:08.560 He said, So you say whatever you want to say, 0:24:09.280 --> 0:24:10.760 and I'll say whatever I want to say. I mean, 0:24:10.840 --> 0:24:13.800