Speaker 1: This is Alec Baldwin and you're listening to Here's the thing.
Speaker 1: A couple of months ago, I sat down with actor
Speaker 1: John Tuturo in front of a live audience at the
Speaker 1: Jerome L. Green Performance Space at New York Public Radio.
Speaker 1: I've done a couple of these live interviews, and uh,
Speaker 1: this is someone who in this business, somebody who I've
Speaker 1: admired for so many years as an actor, who has
Speaker 1: appeared in so many great films and rich films and
Speaker 1: diverse films. And I worked with so many incredible directors,
Speaker 1: and there's so many indelible images from the Cone Brothers
Speaker 1: and Woody Allen and Scorsese and of course Spike Lee.
Speaker 1: There's so many roles worked in the theater. And and
Speaker 1: for anybody who is like me, who is always desperate,
Speaker 1: and that is the word, desperate to find my next
Speaker 1: binge viewing source on TV. The night of the program
Speaker 1: on HBO, remember writing to him and to Steve Zali
Speaker 1: and the producer and director and creator, and to Richard Price.
Speaker 1: I was like, you know, how are you going to
Speaker 1: wrap this up in the final episode. It was just
Speaker 1: like the most incredibly nugety thing that was happening in
Speaker 1: that show, and I love that show The Night Of,
Speaker 1: and I hope they do more of it. But but again,
Speaker 1: I love doing this program because I get to pick
Speaker 1: people that I want to talk to. I'm very grateful
Speaker 1: to our guests this evening for agreeing to do this.
Speaker 1: I don't think he has a lot of this stuff.
Speaker 1: I don't think he has been the spare time. But
Speaker 1: please join me and welcoming our very special guest, John Taturo. Now,
Speaker 1: all of the things we're going to talk about, he
Speaker 1: and I unfortunately already covered backstage. We try to avoid that.
Speaker 1: We try to avoid getting too cozy backstage. But I
Speaker 1: remember um we were talking about and I was just
Speaker 1: briefly touching on what it's like for you to produce
Speaker 1: and write and direct your own films, because you've had
Speaker 1: this incredible career as a film actor, and you've made
Speaker 1: so many great films that are other people's projects, and
Speaker 1: you're an actor for higher But when you do your
Speaker 1: own thing, described me, for example, the one you just finished.
Speaker 1: I just finished the film called Going Places. It's a
Speaker 1: adaptation or reimagining of a French film called la vel SEUs,
Speaker 1: which is from the from the seventies, and it was
Speaker 1: also a book by buttomb Lier level suss it means
Speaker 1: the waltzers or the testicles. Uh. It was a film
Speaker 1: that made Gerard Depardu a star actually, uh, and it's
Speaker 1: a really trans aggressive sort of It's considered kind of
Speaker 1: a classic in France. Pauline Kole was a big champion
Speaker 1: of the film, and it was a film that kind
Speaker 1: of blew my mind when I was a kid, and uh,
Speaker 1: I was rewatching it and I wrote to a Bilie
Speaker 1: and I asked him, as it, would you ever think
Speaker 1: that someone could make a you know, an American version
Speaker 1: of it? And uh he said, yeah, I've seen your
Speaker 1: films and you're crazy enough, and here's the rights. So anyway,
Speaker 1: it took me a long time to do that, and uh,
Speaker 1: you know, to to to adapt it and get the
Speaker 1: money to do it, and uh, that's why my hair
Speaker 1: is this way. Uh. And I actually, during the course
Speaker 1: of it, uh was doing readings of it and I
Speaker 1: was kind of unhappy with what I was doing. And
Speaker 1: then I thought of, well, you know, there's a character
Speaker 1: I've done in a play and I think I and
Speaker 1: also in a movie and it would kind of maybe
Speaker 1: work and I tried it and it did and so
Speaker 1: I'm going to uh reprise, Wow, I am. I have
Speaker 1: reprised the character of Jesus Quintana. So he's he's going
Speaker 1: to be in this film. He is in the film.
Speaker 1: So I took this French movie and a character that
Speaker 1: I had created at the public theater and then in
Speaker 1: another movie, and I kind of pushed them all together
Speaker 1: and it kind of worked out, at least in my mind.
Speaker 1: It's interesting how someone said that once about Berto Lucci
Speaker 1: and Last Tango, how he picked two actors h and
Speaker 1: he wanted he he identified an actor and an actress
Speaker 1: and he went into their filmography to figure out who
Speaker 1: through a character they had played, that character would have
Speaker 1: grown to become the character in my film right now.
Speaker 1: It's it's the truth. Sometimes you want to revisit somebody
Speaker 1: years later and uh, but you know, you have to
Speaker 1: be kind of a little crazy to attempt to do
Speaker 1: one of these things. I started out the first movie
Speaker 1: I made Mac that was a play and it took me.
Speaker 1: I worked on it for like ten years, and uh,
Speaker 1: it was my first movie. And after I did that,
Speaker 1: many people asked me to direct other movies. But I
Speaker 1: kind of knew that I wasn't really a director for hire.
Speaker 1: And I did my film because I did that film
Speaker 1: because I understood that world. I grew up in it.
Speaker 1: My father was a builder, and there were no films
Speaker 1: ever made about builders. You know, It's always about you know,
Speaker 1: gangsters or criminals or lawyers, but you never see a
Speaker 1: film about you know, bricklayers or builders or bridge builders.
Speaker 1: And uh, I wanted to make a film about that
Speaker 1: because it's a very uh challenging and dramatic business. You know,
Speaker 1: it can be a very dangerous business. Also, your father
Speaker 1: was in construction. My father was a building a builder. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and your mother was a housewifether she had. My mother
Speaker 1: was a person. She was a musician and then she
Speaker 1: kind of gave it up. Her brothers were professional musicians,
Speaker 1: but she wanted to be like a designer. But she
Speaker 1: was a very talented person, probably the most talented person
Speaker 1: in our family. But uh, she didn't really get a
Speaker 1: chance to do all of that, but she certainly made
Speaker 1: sure that. You know, we had that. How many kids
Speaker 1: in your family, you and your brother, three boys. I'm
Speaker 1: the middle child. And what did your family think about
Speaker 1: when you wanted to go to New Paul's and then
Speaker 1: Yale Drama School. And my father wanted me to have
Speaker 1: a backup plan, you know. You wanted me to be
Speaker 1: a lawyer or a doctor, and I was pretty good
Speaker 1: in school. He didn't want me to be a carpentery.
Speaker 1: He wanted me to be an architect, you know, he
Speaker 1: he thought, but I wasn't really good enough and math
Speaker 1: to do that. But he wanted me to be professional man,
Speaker 1: you know, like a lot of immigrant. My father was
Speaker 1: wasn't born here. He was born in Italy and he
Speaker 1: came here and then he wound up being you know,
Speaker 1: in the service. He was in World War Two, he
Speaker 1: was in invasion of D Day, and uh, you know,
Speaker 1: so he was a real kind of American guy. You know.
Speaker 1: He wanted me to to reap all those rewards. So
Speaker 1: when you are a child, I mean, because you and
Speaker 1: I are roughly the same age, when you were young,
Speaker 1: what was film and theater in your life? As a child?
Speaker 1: Was your house a lot of music and uh, I
Speaker 1: guess film. I mean we would go to the movies
Speaker 1: all the time. But obviously probably like you, we watched
Speaker 1: million Dollar movie, you know what I mean. And the
Speaker 1: Honeymooners and all those classic things that really influenced us.
Speaker 1: And uh, I mean, I think what a lot of
Speaker 1: those Warner Brothers films, because they would always be on
Speaker 1: over and over again with Edward g and Robinson and
Speaker 1: James Cagney, and you know, oh I loved I loved
Speaker 1: so many of them, you know, and uh, you know,
Speaker 1: uh one time I would want to be Bert Lancaster,
Speaker 1: and then I would want to be James Cagney, and
Speaker 1: then uh, I mean, I still love those actors. And
Speaker 1: I love those actors because they're really physical and you
Speaker 1: really see their whole performance, and uh, they're still you know,
Speaker 1: Barbara Stanwick. You know, I just you know, just crazy
Speaker 1: about them, and I still have remained. So I remember
Speaker 1: when I was a kid, my favorite death scene was
Speaker 1: in a city for Conquest. Kazan gets shot by the
Speaker 1: river and they dumped the body in the river and
Speaker 1: the guys dropped the gun and the guy picks up
Speaker 1: the gun and they piste a whoop. The guy who
Speaker 1: wakes up picks up the gun, he shoots Kazan and
Speaker 1: Kazan's get shoty as my favorite definitely goes ah jeez.
Speaker 1: I never figured on that at all. That's good. That's
Speaker 1: a great one. And that's a real tier Jericho at
Speaker 1: the end because he goes he goes blind at the
Speaker 1: end with Anne Jaran and so you know you always
Speaker 1: my girl, you know, at the end he's selling newspapers,
Speaker 1: you know, and it's like, you know, James, you know
Speaker 1: that's uh so those that was an inspiration. And then
Speaker 1: when I was introduced when I saw a theater when
Speaker 1: I was a teenager, my mother would take me to
Speaker 1: some place and I did get a chance to see
Speaker 1: al Pacino do the tiger wear necktie. Yeah, I didn't
Speaker 1: you know who he was, but my mother and I
Speaker 1: were like, wow, who's that guy? You know in that play?
Speaker 1: And uh we saw some musicals ben Verene, you know,
Speaker 1: and uh it was like just watching live performers. I was.
Speaker 1: I thought, Wow, maybe that's something I could do because
Speaker 1: I never knew anyone. And what made you think from
Speaker 1: It's interesting because for me, I never dreamed of that.
Speaker 1: Like I thought I thought movie stars were like, you know,
Speaker 1: hatched and pods on some other planets and I flew
Speaker 1: them here in a spaceship and like nobody really went
Speaker 1: and did that from no, I mean we knew a
Speaker 1: prop man. He lived across the street from us, and
Speaker 1: that was like as close as I was to the movies.
Speaker 1: So theater was the first entree about maybe trying to
Speaker 1: do that, you know, in college. You know. It wasn't
Speaker 1: until I saw Dustin Hoffman actually, which when I saw
Speaker 1: clips for the Academy Award, I was too young to
Speaker 1: see Midnight Cowboy. I was shocked, I was. I remember
Speaker 1: seeing it. I say like, wow, this guy looks like
Speaker 1: someone in our family, you know what, you know, what's
Speaker 1: he doing in the movie? How can he be in
Speaker 1: a movie? You know? And I was like kind of
Speaker 1: shocked to see him. And it was kind of shocking
Speaker 1: because he sort of opened the doors for these other
Speaker 1: Pacino and de Niro and all those guys. And but
Speaker 1: that was really I never forget seeing those clips of
Speaker 1: you know, for the Academy Awards. And then when you
Speaker 1: went to New Paul, she went for drama and I
Speaker 1: had him, Yeah, and I had him. I did a
Speaker 1: minor in English and yes, and I was in there
Speaker 1: for four years. Yes, My first play I did was
Speaker 1: One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. I played Chief Browndon
Speaker 1: because this Italian teacher said, you know, listen, you probably
Speaker 1: could play an Indian, so you should audition for you know,
Speaker 1: And I was like, all right, different times, different times,
Speaker 1: I can't do that. Now. If you see a lot
Speaker 1: of those guys you know who were in these like
Speaker 1: Anthony Quinn, he played Indians, you know originally you know, Uh,
Speaker 1: Jeff Chandler, Jeff Chandler, Yeah, Burt Lancaster Apache. So yeah,
Speaker 1: and when you were there, what evolved like when you
Speaker 1: were at New Paulse what do you remember propelled you
Speaker 1: want to keep going? Well, I did a few plays
Speaker 1: of you from the Bridge Cuckoo's Nest. Uh. Later on
Speaker 1: I didn't so I I I felt like, Uh, I
Speaker 1: found something that I really I was very raw and
Speaker 1: I was I was not that you know skilled. I
Speaker 1: remember one teacher thought I was. But I wasn't afraid,
Speaker 1: you know, to try things. And uh, I had a
Speaker 1: few teachers who took me under their wing, and uh
Speaker 1: they had a major influence on Beverly Brown. She passed away,
Speaker 1: but she what did she gave you? What did she
Speaker 1: do for you? She she basically educated me in many
Speaker 1: different ways and you know, taught me how to break
Speaker 1: down a script, how to you know, play an objective,
Speaker 1: you know how to listen to the other actor, you
Speaker 1: know how to work physically. And she spent so much
Speaker 1: time with me, you know, out of the classroom too
Speaker 1: that I had. I had a bunch of teachers. They
Speaker 1: really cared about me, and they cared about other schools.
Speaker 1: And I, you know, I'm still friends with I never,
Speaker 1: you know, cut off my relationship with those people. It's
Speaker 1: interesting because like I think about people who and it
Speaker 1: is kind of a latent learning, Like they say things
Speaker 1: to you when it comes back to you even years later,
Speaker 1: what they said to you. You know, I remember I
Speaker 1: did a I had a woman, Mia Rostova. She's a
Speaker 1: wonderful Stova was my teacher for a year. She taught
Speaker 1: her in an apartment that she borrowed from a friend
Speaker 1: of hers, her by the old Barneys. But she was
Speaker 1: my teacher. And she passed away a few years or
Speaker 1: she was ninety nine years old. And uh, we did
Speaker 1: a scene once. I'll never forget this incredible lesson she
Speaker 1: gave me of not playing everything at the expense of
Speaker 1: the other actor. Because you're a very warm and very
Speaker 1: generous actor. You know, you have a you have a
Speaker 1: great passion, but you're not selfish. And that's such an
Speaker 1: incredible thing I see and people. I'm always drawn to
Speaker 1: actors like that because Rostova would be there and the
Speaker 1: actors would do the scene and the guys at the table,
Speaker 1: and the woman comes in in her trench coat and
Speaker 1: she has her pocketbook and her back bags of groceries
Speaker 1: or whatever, and the guy goes, what time is it? Says,
Speaker 1: she goes at six o'clock. He says, where are you been?
Speaker 1: Rostova literally goes, okay, let's stop. That's right, that's right,
Speaker 1: and she goes. She was obviously had a very heavy accent.
Speaker 1: She says, why you talk to her like this? What?
Speaker 1: Because he prepared it. That's why he went to show,
Speaker 1: he said. He says, why don't you not say what
Speaker 1: time is it? Where you've been? He's the where you
Speaker 1: were going. We have plenty of time to get there,
Speaker 1: you know, because I worked on in daytime a lot
Speaker 1: to the soap and there were guys we used to
Speaker 1: joke about who They always were going to lay into
Speaker 1: you in the scene, even when they said they loved you.
Speaker 1: They were like, I love you, Mary, Yeah, I love you.
Speaker 1: You know. They was really like all attention you did
Speaker 1: you did you feel that you had that innately, that
Speaker 1: kind of general spirit you have. I think, you know,
Speaker 1: I was a pretty good listener, but I think I
Speaker 1: refined it when I studied the Sandy Meisner technique at
Speaker 1: Carnegy Hall with Robert X Motika. He really that's what
Speaker 1: it's all about, you know, listening and responding and letting
Speaker 1: your partner affect you and doing out of that. And uh,
Speaker 1: I thought that was very very good training and it's essential.
Speaker 1: But when this is then you decided to go to Yale,
Speaker 1: why did you want to dive in and go right
Speaker 1: to work? I did. I tried to go to work.
Speaker 1: I was very shy about going out there and hustling.
Speaker 1: I was a school teacher for a while. I taught
Speaker 1: at UH, I was a substitute. I taught at Rice
Speaker 1: High School in Harlem to teach American history. And I
Speaker 1: also taught at a Catholic school called Our Lady Queen
Speaker 1: of Martyr UH fifth and sixth graders. And I and
Speaker 1: I got invited back to both of these things, but
Speaker 1: I was doing showcases, and I and my teacher, Beverly Broum,
Speaker 1: had gone to Yale, and I thought, you know what,
Speaker 1: I don't know really how to hustle that much, you know,
Speaker 1: I was I was kind of shy. So I applied
Speaker 1: to n y U and to Yale, and I got
Speaker 1: into both programs and I got a scholarship to Yale,
Speaker 1: and uh, I thought, well, you know, I'll give it
Speaker 1: a shot. And uh, you know, my father was overjoyed
Speaker 1: because he loved the masonry work I kept. When he
Speaker 1: was like he didn't care. He was like, oh my god,
Speaker 1: look at the buildings, you know, and he was like,
Speaker 1: oh my god. So uh uh And then you know
Speaker 1: I did. I worked a lot there and uh and
Speaker 1: I you know, I did a little new plays, got
Speaker 1: classical plays. Uh. You know, so when you get out
Speaker 1: of Yale and what do you do? Then Lloyd Richards
Speaker 1: gave me a job. I mean I auditioned and I
Speaker 1: did two plays, one by Keith ra Dean who was
Speaker 1: a friend of mine, and one by John Patrick Shanlon.
Speaker 1: And uh that's how I met John and I did
Speaker 1: uh the Light, the Light version of Danny in a
Speaker 1: Deep Blue cy Uh. And then eventually John, you know,
Speaker 1: brought me back to do a workshop at Circle Rep.
Speaker 1: And then I did it later on at the Actors
Speaker 1: Theater of Louisville, and then we brought it to New York.
Speaker 1: And really that was my entree, you know, people seeing
Speaker 1: me on stage, and and I got other work, you
Speaker 1: know from that play, you know. And John really a
Speaker 1: big effect on me, you know, he you know, he
Speaker 1: wanted me to be in like everything he wrote at
Speaker 1: that time, and I did every reading and but he
Speaker 1: was really supportive of me. And uh, you know, he's
Speaker 1: the one who really fought for me to be in
Speaker 1: Five Corners and uh, you know, I really owe a
Speaker 1: lot to John. Uh And uh the Five Corners was
Speaker 1: the movie with Jodie Foster and Tim Robbins. That was
Speaker 1: the beginning, really, and then I started getting in some
Speaker 1: movies and I did. I work with Billy Freakin and uh,
Speaker 1: I've lived to talk about it. Uh, And I worked
Speaker 1: with Michael Tremino and lived to talk about talk about that.
Speaker 1: You did you did to live in l A? Yeah,
Speaker 1: freaking yeah. And that was a pretty wild movie. Was
Speaker 1: with Bill Peterson and uh, Willem Dafoe and Johnny pack
Speaker 1: Out and none of us, I don't think I had
Speaker 1: been maybe Willem had been in the movie and he
Speaker 1: was pretty out there guy, and uh, you had to
Speaker 1: be careful physically. You don't know what he was gonna
Speaker 1: do to you. And uh we worked in a in
Speaker 1: a prison, uh which with prisoners, with guys on towers
Speaker 1: with machine guns, and uh we we all had altercations
Speaker 1: with him on the film. And I didn't know, you know,
Speaker 1: this is what moviemaking is like that maybe the director
Speaker 1: will jump on top of you, you know. Uh, but
Speaker 1: he did and uh and I think I learned a
Speaker 1: lot from working with him and working with Amino because
Speaker 1: you didn't know what was going to happen. I mean,
Speaker 1: it's kind of the cocaine eighties, you know. But there
Speaker 1: were directors that, you know, tell the other actor, you know,
Speaker 1: hit him in the face, stop him in the face.
Speaker 1: Even if we were doing a scene like this, you
Speaker 1: know how right, I'm a doctor. Hit him in the face,
Speaker 1: hit him in the face, put him in a face.
Speaker 1: So it was like the deer Hunter scene, the Russian
Speaker 1: Roulette scene applied to every other scene. And you know, uh,
Speaker 1: but I I you know, I learned to ride a
Speaker 1: horse on the film. I worked with min know, and
Speaker 1: I think I learned. Yeah, And it was really I
Speaker 1: was like the only Italian person in the entire movie,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. I was Italian American at
Speaker 1: half Sicilian, and everyone else was from all over the world.
Speaker 1: And but I think those move those movies really helped
Speaker 1: me for later on to be able to stand up
Speaker 1: for myself and say, you know, no, I don't agree,
Speaker 1: I'm not going to do that. But it is that
Speaker 1: a part of it meaning because for me, you know,
Speaker 1: I remember the beginning of my career, and you might
Speaker 1: find this hard to believe. I was actually very guileless
Speaker 1: and I was very tender and uh, and I get
Speaker 1: to work and I didn't want to piss anybody off.
Speaker 1: And so you're you're you're you're the guest in their house,
Speaker 1: and you want to be professional, and you confuse professionalism
Speaker 1: what's kind of laying down and just done, just laying
Speaker 1: down and not having an opinion. And the minute you
Speaker 1: start to have an opinion about anything, people are like,
Speaker 1: you know, oh Jesus Christ, you know you know that
Speaker 1: you're difficult, and uh, it's very interesting that you say
Speaker 1: that that you remember. On a couple of occasions, I
Speaker 1: sit there and I say, you know, I know this
Speaker 1: doesn't really make sense to me. And I wound up
Speaker 1: where like the Rector, I wouldn't even speak for like
Speaker 1: three months. It's a very difficult process. No, it's hard
Speaker 1: to speak, not speaking for three months because I think
Speaker 1: the fear of being fired. If you're an actor, it's
Speaker 1: so hard to get hired. The fear of being fired
Speaker 1: is held over your head and you have to get
Speaker 1: to the point where you don't care if you'll be fired,
Speaker 1: you know, to say I don't I'm not going to
Speaker 1: do that. And uh. I did that on Five Corners
Speaker 1: the first day and the guy tried to block a
Speaker 1: scene and Bill and I said I don't want to
Speaker 1: do it, and he said what I said, and I
Speaker 1: wanted to be sitting against the wall because the guy
Speaker 1: had gotten out of prison, and I kind of laid
Speaker 1: it down and that was the beginning. And then I
Speaker 1: had a very good collaboration during that movie. And that's
Speaker 1: the first movie I felt like I was doing what
Speaker 1: I could do on stage, but in a movie. And
Speaker 1: then what happens after you do uh? And I started
Speaker 1: getting you know different. Uh. Spike Lee, you know, called
Speaker 1: me up. The Cohen Brothers knew me because I went
Speaker 1: to school with Frances mcdorman's, so they saw all the
Speaker 1: plays I was I was in, so they would see
Speaker 1: me all the time. I come kind of friends with them.
Speaker 1: So then I eventually told me they were writing apart
Speaker 1: from me. But it took them all such a long
Speaker 1: time to write because this crossing because they had writer's block,
Speaker 1: and in the middle of it, they wrote Barton Fink.
Speaker 1: That's how they wrote Barton Fink. And Uh. So then
Speaker 1: I did, Uh. I did. Spike asked me to come
Speaker 1: in and and I read Do the Right Thing and
Speaker 1: uh because he saw five Corners and you know, I
Speaker 1: was excited when I read it. I said, well, this
Speaker 1: is about what's going on. And I grew up in
Speaker 1: a you know, I grew up in a black neighborhood.
Speaker 1: I moved to a white neighborhood. I was bust out
Speaker 1: to all black school, so a lot of you know,
Speaker 1: the issues were issues that I grew up with. And uh,
Speaker 1: and Spike and I really became very, very close friends.
Speaker 1: The film came out of ninety it's a last year
Speaker 1: you had. When did they screen there in the city.
Speaker 1: What was that like for you to go back? And well,
Speaker 1: it was weird because you know, I was the I
Speaker 1: played the racist sky. So when we would go to Daily's,
Speaker 1: which Spike invited everyone to at l i uh Long
Speaker 1: Island University in on Flatbush and Brooklyn, you'd see that,
Speaker 1: you know, the five takes of me saying all these
Speaker 1: racist things. And sometimes there were people and the crew
Speaker 1: you know, had never worked on a movie before, like
Speaker 1: the lady and craft services, and she was a black lady,
Speaker 1: and she wouldn't she wouldn't talk to me, you know
Speaker 1: what I mean. She actually told me, she said, you know,
Speaker 1: I hate you. You know, she's amazing. I hate you
Speaker 1: so much. And I told Spikes advanced, you can tell
Speaker 1: us I'm doing a podcast, and you know, he was
Speaker 1: laughing and stuff like that. So I was kind of
Speaker 1: you know, uh, you know, worried about, you know, what
Speaker 1: would happen. But it was only really positive to response.
Speaker 1: But when we saw the Anniversary, Michael Jackson had just died,
Speaker 1: and I have a line in the movie, we goes
Speaker 1: fuck you, fuck Frank Sanatra, I say, how fuck you
Speaker 1: and fuck Michael Jackson too, and he was right after
Speaker 1: he died, and once again the audience led out this
Speaker 1: big spots. I was like, oh, my god, I can
Speaker 1: never get away and go back to zero again, you know,
Speaker 1: but you know, it was, it was. It was an
Speaker 1: exciting movie, and lots of people had different opinions about
Speaker 1: the movie, even in the people in the movie and
Speaker 1: you were shooting Yeah. Well, we had a long rehearsal process.
Speaker 1: Described that we had a real great group there because
Speaker 1: we all worked together for ten weeks. We were on
Speaker 1: the set every day together with rehearsal for Yeah. And Danny,
Speaker 1: of course was I just saw him the other day
Speaker 1: on the street by Lincoln Center. I got I mean,
Speaker 1: you know, so he was, you know, flying high and
Speaker 1: Ascie Davis and Ruby d and uh. It was really
Speaker 1: it was very upsetting to do the end of the movie.
Speaker 1: It was very upsetting to do the end of it
Speaker 1: was really and there was a lot of tension on
Speaker 1: the set between Danny and Spike about doing the scene
Speaker 1: the way Spike wanted, did this way Spike wanted to prevail.
Speaker 1: Eventually it did, it did, but it got really heated
Speaker 1: and it actually came close to things getting a little
Speaker 1: out of control. Uh and uh, but we managed, you know,
Speaker 1: through it and everything. But I remember, I just didn't
Speaker 1: it was it was sickening, you know, to do some
Speaker 1: of that part. I remember me with Junk, all of
Speaker 1: us posito, and we had our hands around each other's
Speaker 1: throats and you could just feel like, you know, because
Speaker 1: we were all really, you know, so close. And then
Speaker 1: we worked together a lot of movies after that and stuff,
Speaker 1: But that was a really special experience. Coming up, John
Speaker 1: Taturo talks about the crisis but almost convinced him to
Speaker 1: go to medical school at age fifty. Like Taturo, who
Speaker 1: once loved film, canisters around the country looking for funding,
Speaker 1: writer director James Toback is committed to making films on
Speaker 1: his own terms. You need a heavy dose of megalomania
Speaker 1: and a heavy dose of humility. It's a combination of
Speaker 1: the two. Where does your humility come from? From access
Speaker 1: to your humility. The humility is that you say to
Speaker 1: your collaborators, you can either enable me to achieve what
Speaker 1: I know I can do with this movie, or you
Speaker 1: can prevent me from achieving it. I am at your mercy.
Speaker 1: If you can give me what I know, you can
Speaker 1: give me humility or manipulation. No, it's humility because I
Speaker 1: know that if they're not all there for me, and
Speaker 1: if I've made a wrong selection. I'm gonna I'm doomed
Speaker 1: to hear more about James Toback story. Go to Here's
Speaker 1: the Thing dot Org. This is Alec Baldwin and you're
Speaker 1: listening to Here's the Thing. My guest today is actor
Speaker 1: John taturo To Touro captivated the nation as Pino and
Speaker 1: Do the Right Thing, and hasn't stopped mesmerizing audiences. iNTS
Speaker 1: Most recently, we've seen him in HBO's mini series The
Speaker 1: Night Of. Like his other roles, this one is raw, wholehearted,
Speaker 1: vulnerable and brilliant. Tuturo says his work on screen is
Speaker 1: helped by his experience on stage, and in his early
Speaker 1: years he was back and forth between the two. I
Speaker 1: did A Chanley's play Italian American Reconciliation, and then I
Speaker 1: did Milliss Crossing, and I did Millis Crossing. Barton think
Speaker 1: that was aft of Miller's Crossing. Was a Miller's Crossing
Speaker 1: was was first? And and did that and then they
Speaker 1: told me that they had written this movie for me,
Speaker 1: And I thought, they said bart and think and uh
Speaker 1: uh and then you know, and I I mean, and
Speaker 1: out of that movie, I got a lot of work
Speaker 1: and stuff, but I always went back to the theater
Speaker 1: and and uh, you know, and continued to do theater. Now,
Speaker 1: you met your wife at Yale and she was studying
Speaker 1: acting obviously as well. And we've worked together many times,
Speaker 1: and you've directed her with that of you did Max.
Speaker 1: She was the star of the film, and she was
Speaker 1: a star of Illuminata, and I've done a theater with her.
Speaker 1: Master builders that. Like to direct your wife in the film. Well,
Speaker 1: if I was married to an actress once, I'm not
Speaker 1: quite sure how that would have gone. At first. It's
Speaker 1: not good because you know, like your brother, I've directed that.
Speaker 1: I've had my mother, my brother, and if they all
Speaker 1: first and then go no, like you tell him, can
Speaker 1: you do this? No? You know, that's like that's the
Speaker 1: first and then eventually you have to learn, like to
Speaker 1: respect each other. And she's the actress, I'm the director,
Speaker 1: and we have to kind of draw lines and separate that,
Speaker 1: and it's not easy to do. I've talked to even
Speaker 1: people like Joe Cohen, you know, and he's like, I
Speaker 1: let my brother direct friend, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: He says, you know, it's it's it can be, but
Speaker 1: it can be great. Once you get you know, past that.
Speaker 1: So uh. And I think I've had really good collaborations
Speaker 1: with with Kathy, and I think she's done some wonderful
Speaker 1: work in and she doesn't want to act anymore. No,
Speaker 1: she's now studying social work. And what do you observe
Speaker 1: a about that where it just kind of goes out
Speaker 1: to just leave somebody's body she doesn't want to. I
Speaker 1: think it happens. I'm sure it's probably happened to you.
Speaker 1: You think at one time of your life, you know,
Speaker 1: maybe that's something I want to do different. It's happened
Speaker 1: to me. Sometimes while I'm on the set shooting a film,
Speaker 1: I'll be like, yeah, yeah, I go home. I mean
Speaker 1: I I had a sort of crisis maybe eight nine,
Speaker 1: ten years ago and told my doctor, I said, you know,
Speaker 1: I'm done with this business. I've got to do something
Speaker 1: really important, like what you do. I said, I want
Speaker 1: to go to medical school. I was like fifty years old.
Speaker 1: And he was like, John, you're crazy. It was like,
Speaker 1: you know, you know how long medical school takes, you know?
Speaker 1: And he said, think what you do is there's a
Speaker 1: value to what you do? And I was like, no,
Speaker 1: there's not, you know, uh, And he talked me out
Speaker 1: of it, and uh, but you know it's everyone hits that.
Speaker 1: I guess it's sometimes it's interesting how And I'd love
Speaker 1: to hear this in your own words, you know, the
Speaker 1: acting experience, and a lot of it has to do
Speaker 1: with the people that I'm working with, like if they
Speaker 1: can hit the ball back, you know what I mean,
Speaker 1: Like if I really like somebody. I did this over
Speaker 1: the edge with Tony Hopkins, I'll never thinket They called
Speaker 1: me and they said, oh, de Niro was supposed to
Speaker 1: play the lead, and he dropped out to say we
Speaker 1: got to Anthony Hopkins and I started to cry. I mean,
Speaker 1: I forgot on vacation with my ex wife and where
Speaker 1: her family were on Carolina at the beach house. And
Speaker 1: I sat there and started getting like these chess palpitations
Speaker 1: because I worshiped Tony so much. I just loved Tony.
Speaker 1: I thought, how gonna get to go make a movie?
Speaker 1: It's me and him? Right. Harold Perrino, who was on
Speaker 1: the show Lost African American guy for a young, very
Speaker 1: good looking He had the funniest line because the three
Speaker 1: of us are lost in the woods, and he said,
Speaker 1: Alec Baldwin, Anthony Hopkins and Harold Perrino. I wonder which
Speaker 1: one the bear is going to eat the first? And
Speaker 1: so he dies in the film, Um, you know, page forty,
Speaker 1: page thirty, he gets chewed on and he was very
Speaker 1: funny Harold. But but but but we do the movie
Speaker 1: and there's Tony and I in the woods for like
Speaker 1: four or five six weeks there in Canada, and it
Speaker 1: was just such a great I mean, I loved it.
Speaker 1: And he's a one. He's a wonderful person. Yeah. I
Speaker 1: actually did a movie that he directed me and that
Speaker 1: he wrote, which I've never seen actually Slipstream. It's called
Speaker 1: And I had so much fun working with him. I
Speaker 1: play someone who's like a figment of his imagination. And
Speaker 1: he said to me once, he said, uh, Jones, Jones,
Speaker 1: I'd like you to do this scene. He said, um,
Speaker 1: excuse metaphorice and like a cock roage on fire. I said,
Speaker 1: you know, Mr Hopkins, you were speaking my language. So
Speaker 1: we laughed. So we had so much fun. He's such
Speaker 1: an open guy. He's such a wonderful, attractive guy. And
Speaker 1: I was like, like you, I've always loved his work
Speaker 1: from Equis and QB seven. You know, when I first
Speaker 1: saw him. Yeah. I mean it was my mother who
Speaker 1: told me to watch him on that. Uh, but he's
Speaker 1: a wonderful person. He said, we we do the film.
Speaker 1: And I said to him, my god, you worked with
Speaker 1: Olivi And I said, and you did all these plays
Speaker 1: and they're from this great tradition. And I said, you
Speaker 1: from ms the theater and plays. He was like, no,
Speaker 1: I hate the theater, my love, and to test the theater,
Speaker 1: really you do? I said, you never want to go
Speaker 1: back into a place, and no, I only want my life.
Speaker 1: I wanted to move to California, didn't become an American
Speaker 1: film star, didn't drive my car with the top down,
Speaker 1: the sun in my face, the wind in my head.
Speaker 1: And he wasn't kidding. Does now this was his dream,
Speaker 1: was to be a movie star. Yeah, but he doesn't
Speaker 1: give a about or a pinter or none of it.
Speaker 1: This great tradition. He will ask you, why do you
Speaker 1: like to do theater? He said, well, I like the
Speaker 1: rehearsal process, you know, uh, you know, yeah, But what's
Speaker 1: the pick a pick a film? I mean, obviously there's many,
Speaker 1: because you're you've got so many great films and in
Speaker 1: so much great war. Well, you're doing it and you're
Speaker 1: in it, and you're like, man, this is just bliss
Speaker 1: to me making this film play well some of the
Speaker 1: movies that we talked about. When I worked with Robert
Speaker 1: Redford when I did Questions, Yeah, I was, I really,
Speaker 1: I mean I gained a lot of weight and everything
Speaker 1: to do it, and uh, but uh that was a
Speaker 1: really that was a really fun experience. And I loved
Speaker 1: working with him and he was He's just like multifaceted,
Speaker 1: kind of eccentric guy, you know, and uh he just
Speaker 1: was so uh good in specific details, physical details to
Speaker 1: help free you. And uh we got along just incredibly well.
Speaker 1: And I think probably shows maybe in my performance. I
Speaker 1: really was very free, you know with him, and I
Speaker 1: really wanted to please him. I really did, because he
Speaker 1: he was so good looking, he is uh and uh
Speaker 1: he's very you know, he's really seductive, you know in
Speaker 1: getting you to to be relaxed and everything. But he
Speaker 1: was a real consummate craftsman. You know, he's from the theater.
Speaker 1: And I loved working with him, and uh that was
Speaker 1: a real joy. And also a movie I've made, uh
Speaker 1: with a great Italian director, Francisco Rosie, which I was
Speaker 1: a adaptation of a Primo Levee book, and I was
Speaker 1: involved with that for about five years, and I think
Speaker 1: that's one of the best things I've ever done. I
Speaker 1: don't really talk a lot in film, uh, but I
Speaker 1: also got a real education with him in in Italian filmmaking.
Speaker 1: And also I got to study everything about Primo Levia
Speaker 1: for like four or five years. And uh, I really
Speaker 1: I think I really changed my life. So I don't
Speaker 1: like the word foodie, but you're somebody who you appreciate,
Speaker 1: You into cooking, you and your boyfriend of cooking. Is
Speaker 1: it true? You guys, sit down, you have to like
Speaker 1: these meals. And my wife's a really good cook, and
Speaker 1: I helped prepare and clean, yeah and eat U. But yeah,
Speaker 1: but I think you know my mother was Yeah, my
Speaker 1: mother could. She was a world class Yeah, that's right.
Speaker 1: And uh, you know a lot of my friends would
Speaker 1: come over my house to eat, so, you know, because
Speaker 1: and they also liked to talk to my father, who
Speaker 1: was a very good storyteller. So you know. Uh, my
Speaker 1: father was like very childlike in his you know, like
Speaker 1: if he'd watched movies with him, he was like he
Speaker 1: was in the movie. You know, there's a movie that
Speaker 1: we used to watch together, Brute Force that burnt Lancasters.
Speaker 1: Have you seen that with you and Crone? My father
Speaker 1: was like he was like in the movie. You know,
Speaker 1: So that's how it wasn't my house like you were
Speaker 1: in it. My dad was the same way, yeah, you know,
Speaker 1: my dad was my My dad would come home from
Speaker 1: work and we lay there and my mother was kind
Speaker 1: of with six children and no money to help her
Speaker 1: raise her children. My mother was completely you know, blotto
Speaker 1: at the end of the night of sleep in her
Speaker 1: bed at like ten o'clock and I'd say, who's gonna
Speaker 1: let Dad in the house. I literally had a run
Speaker 1: of time probably last about two or three years where
Speaker 1: I got away with us. I said, I'm gonna stay
Speaker 1: up and make sure Dad's okay when he gets home.
Speaker 1: My mother will be like and I go in the
Speaker 1: living room and wait for my father to come home,
Speaker 1: and I greet my father. Everybody else is asleep, and
Speaker 1: my father would be like a very you know, taciturn,
Speaker 1: what are you doing up whatever? And I'd say, uh,
Speaker 1: we sit down on the couch and he broke it
Speaker 1: up The New York Times and he's had those really
Speaker 1: pithy little capsule reviews in the times of movies on
Speaker 1: the Late Show, and he'd say, that's a good one.
Speaker 1: I said, what's that? It's a How Green Was My Valley?
Speaker 1: It's a great movie. I maybe we watched like fifteen
Speaker 1: minutes of all right, fifteen minutes, we're gonna watch fifteen
Speaker 1: minutes this movie. Get to bed, you're gonna go to
Speaker 1: school tomorrow. And I sit there and within fifteen minutes
Speaker 1: it worked like a trump. He'd passed out of sleep,
Speaker 1: and I watched all of How Green Was My Valley
Speaker 1: one o'clock in the morning on the Late Show. And
Speaker 1: at times that we would watch the movies together, he
Speaker 1: would like put his hand out during the moment, you know,
Speaker 1: you know, he wishes to be a quarter of the
Speaker 1: same rights as a sponge. And my father would go,
Speaker 1: he wishes to think, you know, like uh, Spencer, Tracy
Speaker 1: and some with you. My father would quote all the lines.
Speaker 1: You know, maybe it was the same for you, man.
Speaker 1: It was a real kind of sharing experience. Your wife's
Speaker 1: a great cook. She comes from an Italian householdier. No,
Speaker 1: my wife's Russian Jewish. She learned to know. She learned
Speaker 1: to cook. Does she learned to cook from your family.
Speaker 1: How does she learns? Has increased her repertoire over the years? Yes,
Speaker 1: she's now she's a very good cook. And you made
Speaker 1: movies where this is the central Well, I've made movies
Speaker 1: I made. I made a documentary Co Passoni, which is
Speaker 1: all about Neapolitan music, because I was introduced to Neapolitan
Speaker 1: culture by Francisco Rosie. I've actually performed in the theater
Speaker 1: in in Italy twice. That's an interesting experience performing in
Speaker 1: the theater in Italy. It's very interesting. Well, I did
Speaker 1: this one play. It's a it's a play. It's like
Speaker 1: a neo realist play. It's a play about poor people
Speaker 1: and the guy and the guy who's married to this woman.
Speaker 1: She has a lover, but he either imagines or he
Speaker 1: just makes him into a ghost because the guy leaves money,
Speaker 1: you know, for the whole thing. And at the end
Speaker 1: of the play, the guy goes away he doesn't want
Speaker 1: to be the lover of his wife anymore, and the
Speaker 1: money drives up and he sees the guy and he
Speaker 1: thinks he's a ghost, or maybe he's made himself think
Speaker 1: he's a ghost, and he explains to him, you know,
Speaker 1: it's it's hard to be in love when you don't
Speaker 1: have money. You know, if you if you don't have
Speaker 1: if you can't buy someone apparent air rings or or
Speaker 1: a nice handkerchief, you know, the love can die, you know,
Speaker 1: if you're poor and you're starving. It's a beautiful speech
Speaker 1: and it was written in by Donald Felippo. So I
Speaker 1: came out to do it in Naples in English mostly
Speaker 1: we did a little bit of Neapolitan. And when I
Speaker 1: came out to do the speech and I said the
Speaker 1: first line, and I saw rows of handkerchiefs come out
Speaker 1: of people's jackets rose and I was like, whoa, yeah,
Speaker 1: because it distracts here, right, it's the white in the audience.
Speaker 1: And then I said a couple more lines and then
Speaker 1: they were all, you know, working themselves up. They were
Speaker 1: doing this basically the speech for me, you know, it
Speaker 1: was like I was surfing on their emotion. So I
Speaker 1: just had to say the line and then you're her,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. And I was like, I
Speaker 1: can't believe this, I said, I haven't even done the
Speaker 1: speech and there so I was just kind of floating
Speaker 1: on this sea of white handkerchiefs. I never had experience
Speaker 1: like that ever in my life. You know, I see
Speaker 1: people now and in my own work, in my own
Speaker 1: life where you are pitching and trying to make films
Speaker 1: and television shows and what have you, and it's so
Speaker 1: difficult to raise money now it's it's, it's, it's, it's, it's.
Speaker 1: It's this almost mind bendingly difficult prospect. And this idea
Speaker 1: that the business was run years ago by people who
Speaker 1: were filmmakers. They had money, Uh, studios were banks with
Speaker 1: billions of dollars and lines of credit up through the eighties.
Speaker 1: And then at some point um that change and now
Speaker 1: that people we were, that whole spiel about the corportization
Speaker 1: of the media and so forth, how was it changed
Speaker 1: in your mind? And it's much harder business, much harder.
Speaker 1: In the first movie I made was Columbia Try Start Home.
Speaker 1: Video was Larry Estes, who gave money to a lot
Speaker 1: of small films, including sex Lives and Videotape One False Move.
Speaker 1: He must have done like forty five movies he financed,
Speaker 1: and I think we had a little over two million dollars.
Speaker 1: But I had forty three days to shoot my first
Speaker 1: film and my second film, I had forty days, and
Speaker 1: and you know the film I did with then I
Speaker 1: had my forty five days, and then I had thirty days.
Speaker 1: With the movie made with Woody and his last film,
Speaker 1: I had twenty eight days. And you know it's you're
Speaker 1: not twenty five, and you know it's hard to light someone,
Speaker 1: you know, beautifully in that amount of time, So you
Speaker 1: have to cobble it together if you're lucky enough. But
Speaker 1: I feel like people don't always bet on the person.
Speaker 1: And when I first started making movies, there were a
Speaker 1: few people I would talk to and they would they
Speaker 1: would bet on me. They would say, okay, I trust you.
Speaker 1: There was a man in a pan gave me money
Speaker 1: for my second movie, and if that happen, well my
Speaker 1: you know, he was a distributor and he would look
Speaker 1: at my presentation, so all the pictures and the artwork,
Speaker 1: but he was also looking at me and trying to
Speaker 1: judging me as a person, and he was you know,
Speaker 1: he bet on me, not just all the people, all
Speaker 1: the names I have in it. So it's hard. You know,
Speaker 1: it's hard to make a movie because no one ever
Speaker 1: thinks about chemistry. You know, that's like the last thing
Speaker 1: people ever think about. And that it can be essential
Speaker 1: in a movie, whether you're playing your best friend or
Speaker 1: lovers or whatever. And uh, you know, it's almost everything
Speaker 1: is set up against you. So you have to be
Speaker 1: a little crazy and really love the material to say
Speaker 1: I'm going to do something that's different. But of course
Speaker 1: if you do that, then it's even harder, you know,
Speaker 1: because everybody is afraid. I mean I made that movie
Speaker 1: with Woody for example. I've always thought, well, maybe we
Speaker 1: would be in this thing together. And the guy who
Speaker 1: cuts my hair cuts wood He's hair, and I happened
Speaker 1: to mention it and he talks like this, you know,
Speaker 1: And he told Woody this idea that I had. And
Speaker 1: what he was like, well, you have John Comy, so
Speaker 1: you know. Uh and uh, I was like, what did
Speaker 1: you say to wood He? I told him this idea.
Speaker 1: So I went to his office. I had no script, nothing,
Speaker 1: but I had directed some movies and would he you
Speaker 1: know you know what? He well, because you work with
Speaker 1: him a lot. And I sat this close to him.
Speaker 1: He said, so you know we share a bob you know.
Speaker 1: I said yeah, I said yes, I said, I saw.
Speaker 1: I told him the story. I said, you know, you
Speaker 1: run a bookstore. You know, you know, you run out
Speaker 1: of money and then you know, you decide to pimp
Speaker 1: me out and blah blah bah. He goes funny. You know.
Speaker 1: Then I said something else. He goes not funny. Then
Speaker 1: I know something else could be funny, you know. So
Speaker 1: then he said, you write it and then I'll give
Speaker 1: you my criticism, you know. Of I didn't know how
Speaker 1: merciless his criticism could be, you know, I said, oh,
Speaker 1: my God, was beyond merciless. And at the end of it,
Speaker 1: of course, he said, well, I could be wrong, you know.
Speaker 1: So anytime I I any time I would send him
Speaker 1: another draft, I would lay down and read his email.
Speaker 1: There he was just But during the course of it,
Speaker 1: he asked me, you know, to he asked me to
Speaker 1: direct these three one act one of them that he
Speaker 1: had written, and I got to know him quite well.
Speaker 1: And from that I was able to rewrite it one
Speaker 1: by Elaine Mane and uh and Ethan Cohen and I survived.
Speaker 1: But you know, uh, I went to I did all
Speaker 1: these auditions with Woody, which was fascinating, you know, I mean, God,
Speaker 1: you know, he's he's a tough guy to audition for,
Speaker 1: you know. Uh, But I got to know him really well,
Speaker 1: and eventually, you know, he did sign off on the
Speaker 1: script and she did a terrific job. And he was
Speaker 1: a wonderful actor to work with. He's such a good actor.
Speaker 1: And I was like, wow, this guy's good, you know,
Speaker 1: and uh so, but there was a great experience. But
Speaker 1: I did fifteen drafts and he, you knoweth he was
Speaker 1: just like, you know, and when I showed him the
Speaker 1: rough cut, he said, do you want my criticism? I
Speaker 1: was like, I said, well, I said, of course I do,
Speaker 1: because well, you know, he said, you know, he was
Speaker 1: sitting in the chap I'm gonna be brutal, you know.
Speaker 1: And he really liked it. He was so surprised, and
Speaker 1: I was like, wow, you know, I was. But it
Speaker 1: was a great, you know experience, and I telled it
Speaker 1: obviously to him. But my idea that we could be
Speaker 1: good together what's true. But the thing is the funny
Speaker 1: thing when I worked with him was the difference between
Speaker 1: that that chasm between comedy and draw. So we do
Speaker 1: Blue Jasmine and Kate Blanche had his drinking diet cokes
Speaker 1: and chain smoking, and she's got to come in and
Speaker 1: do this scene where she comes apart and we have
Speaker 1: this physical altercation in this house. Kate comes in and
Speaker 1: she does the scene and what he's like, you know,
Speaker 1: you're supposed to be at you with end here in
Speaker 1: the scene and I'm just not buying it. I mean,
Speaker 1: you're supposed to be coming apot completely coming Apot can
Speaker 1: do it at the take. And she does the take
Speaker 1: and she just rings herself out. He's like, I'm just
Speaker 1: not buying it. I'm really have to be just shattered
Speaker 1: and you're broken into a mess. You're just a puddle
Speaker 1: of your own loss significing. And she had smoking and
Speaker 1: drinking the coffee and she comes in, she blows it
Speaker 1: and I hate to be the bearer of bad. Yeah
Speaker 1: that he just rings her out, rings. We turn around,
Speaker 1: we do a scene, and he goes in this scene
Speaker 1: say to her that you want to go back to
Speaker 1: seeing that therapist of hers, uh, and just see some
Speaker 1: doctor's name. And I go and he's looking down at
Speaker 1: the floor and she's here and you're me, and he
Speaker 1: goes just she ed lips some doctor's name and I go,
Speaker 1: Dr Fetterman. He went nothing funny. Yeah, like that's funny,
Speaker 1: no funny, like a whole other thing with everything you
Speaker 1: know he's he's tough man. He's a tough he's a
Speaker 1: tough dude. Now in the time we have left because
Speaker 1: we are going to run out of time unfortunately. So
Speaker 1: I want to talk to you about the HBO series.
Speaker 1: So I've so, I'm and this is a this is
Speaker 1: a true story. I'll tell it quickly. I mention me
Speaker 1: Gandelpheny's memorial service, Jimmy passes away. I love Jimmy. Jimmy
Speaker 1: was everybody who knew Jimmy loved Jimmy. He's a real
Speaker 1: great guy, sweetheart and so talented, and um, sure he
Speaker 1: passes away. They're gonna shelve that project. And as I'm
Speaker 1: sitting there in the memorial services, Alien is behind me,
Speaker 1: sitting behind me that we're waiting for everybody to file in,
Speaker 1: and I'm, for about fifteen seconds, I'm on the verge
Speaker 1: of pitching myself to Zalien for Jimmy's part at Jimmy's
Speaker 1: memorial service. Exactly. You know, I didn't do that, but
Speaker 1: but so the whole thing goes away and then it
Speaker 1: comes back and you are the star of well, I mean,
Speaker 1: how did that happen? Steve wanted me to be in
Speaker 1: his first movie searching for Bobby Fisher. So we've always liked,
Speaker 1: you know, I know he liked my work and I
Speaker 1: liked him a lot, and I guess my name came
Speaker 1: up and he really responded to it, and my agent
Speaker 1: talked to him and then we met and then he
Speaker 1: told me that it was James. And I didn't know
Speaker 1: it at that time. And James was the lead in
Speaker 1: my movie Romance and Cigarettes, so I worked with James
Speaker 1: two years on it. I also know him from the
Speaker 1: time he did You a play because he's dear friends
Speaker 1: with my cousin Aida, and he's the one who helped
Speaker 1: Castor in the Sopranos, and uh, I was very close
Speaker 1: to James, and uh I really had a lot of
Speaker 1: trepidation about it. And then I saw the pilot, which
Speaker 1: was much much longer, and James was only in it
Speaker 1: for one little scene. Of course, he's still interesting with
Speaker 1: a big beard and everything, and but he never talks
Speaker 1: to the guy. He just talks to the cop. And
Speaker 1: I said, Okay, there's not that much of James that
Speaker 1: I have to kind of not think about. It was
Speaker 1: a really challenging experience, but I got to work with
Speaker 1: go Camp, who he did his first job with me,
Speaker 1: Jeannie Berlin and Riz Ahmed, who's wonderful in the show
Speaker 1: as a wonderful guy, and I just happened to really
Speaker 1: hit it off with him as as like people. I
Speaker 1: think it really helped us in the scenes. Uh. But
Speaker 1: it's you know, it's about the system. It's about racism,
Speaker 1: it's about the city, it's about you know, the criminal
Speaker 1: justice system. And when you read that article in New
Speaker 1: Yorker about Caliph Breweder, like the kid who was accused
Speaker 1: of stealing a backpack, you know, it's right on the money.
Speaker 1: And uh, he was someone we actually wanted to meet
Speaker 1: and then he took his own life. Uh. But I
Speaker 1: was really, you know, deeply interested and affected by doing
Speaker 1: something that I thought was a real fair representation. Uh.
Speaker 1: And Steve was indefatigable in his pursuit of truth and
Speaker 1: you know minutia in detail, and uh it was it
Speaker 1: was a great you know, you know, you have to
Speaker 1: be given an opportunity to do something, so I knew,
Speaker 1: I said, this is a good opportunity, and uh, I
Speaker 1: you know, I gave it, gave him my own What's
Speaker 1: funny how that, Jimmy, this is it's it's impossible to
Speaker 1: compare people, and it's just it's it's a waste of time.
Speaker 1: But you know, when he passed away, and Jimmy was
Speaker 1: somebody who had he had his signature, range and stamp
Speaker 1: and persona and so so much of it obvious. He
Speaker 1: dictated by one of the most successful TV shows ever.
Speaker 1: I mean, you knew him right from the beginning, you know,
Speaker 1: I mean you really remember, you get the show becomes
Speaker 1: a hit and Greg Moser calls me on the phone.
Speaker 1: I'm asleep. I flew in from l A and I'm
Speaker 1: sound asleep and Moser calls me, and I asked at
Speaker 1: the phone. He literally goes, quick, who's the number one
Speaker 1: actor on TV? And I literally go what? He goes,
Speaker 1: who's the number one actor on television? Was the biggest
Speaker 1: star on television? I go Michael J. Fox and he
Speaker 1: has no You witty, and it's Jimmy Ken Delphini because
Speaker 1: he just got nominated for an Emmy at that time,
Speaker 1: and the show was really taken up. And here was
Speaker 1: of me, who had this small role in the play
Speaker 1: and he went on to have this great, great where however,
Speaker 1: and I want to just I'm gonna almost wrap it
Speaker 1: up here with saying this and that is what I
Speaker 1: love about that show and we're worked so great about
Speaker 1: that show is that no one can replace someone. It's
Speaker 1: not even about that, but when they look for somebody
Speaker 1: who could create a character that could carry that show.
Speaker 1: You did such a fantastic job and that show. I
Speaker 1: loved watching you in that show. I'm so piste off
Speaker 1: and ended. I can't wait, I know. So the question obviously,
Speaker 1: is there a chance you might come back and do
Speaker 1: another round? You know the potential. So the last thing
Speaker 1: I want to ask you you you have such a
Speaker 1: deep You're very soulful in the work you do. You're
Speaker 1: you're you're you're you're smart, and you're aware. You're so
Speaker 1: many things inside of your acting. There are so many
Speaker 1: good things for people to be, And I'm wondering what
Speaker 1: do you attribute that to? If you can say, are
Speaker 1: you into meditation? Are you what do you like? How
Speaker 1: do you how do you feed your health? I like
Speaker 1: other people, you know, I mean like it's funny, you know,
Speaker 1: when you asked me to do this, I was thinking,
Speaker 1: there's only a couple of people who've ever written me
Speaker 1: a note as an actor and you're one of them,
Speaker 1: like one of the three. You know, you wrote me
Speaker 1: like a note after I did Quick Show. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: you know, I like other people and I think I
Speaker 1: think that's a good thing. I think, and that keeps
Speaker 1: you fresh and alive. And if you're interested in other
Speaker 1: people and working with other people, and I think you
Speaker 1: either you know, you know, curious about that or not,
Speaker 1: because you know, sometimes one plus one can equal five,
Speaker 1: you know, you can, it can be a greater than
Speaker 1: the sum of its parts. And that's what you know
Speaker 1: interests me is to have encounters with people. And so
Speaker 1: I don't know if I get that from my mom,
Speaker 1: you know, my dad, you know. Uh, but I don't
Speaker 1: take my opportunities lightly. I am very thankful when I
Speaker 1: get a really good opportunity. And I still am, I mean,
Speaker 1: because I know how hard it is. You know, it's
Speaker 1: a part of you. You feel like, yeah, I'm good,
Speaker 1: you know, when you're doing it. Then when it's over,
Speaker 1: you're like, did I really do that? You know, did
Speaker 1: I do okay? Or you know whatever. You know, it's
Speaker 1: like and then it's kind of gone like you've never
Speaker 1: done yeah, you know, it's like you're you're still in
Speaker 1: the process of learning, and I think that's something that's good.
Speaker 1: You know, an actor we can improve. Actually, you know
Speaker 1: we're not like done when we're thirty out. I don't know.
Speaker 1: I'm just beginning to edit it right now. And then
Speaker 1: what do you do? What do you do with the
Speaker 1: film festivals? Well, you know, sometimes you can sell it
Speaker 1: in advance. You know, there's people who want to see it,
Speaker 1: and we've shown a little teaser and uh, you know,
Speaker 1: you go from down. Believe me, I've been down that road.
Speaker 1: I have. I've lugged the film canisters around the country,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. But that's okay. If there's
Speaker 1: something that you really love, that's all right. I've done
Speaker 1: it so uh but this case, I think we'll hopefully,
Speaker 1: you know, make a nice cell litilm. We're looking forward
Speaker 1: to see it. Thank you very much for thank you.
Speaker 1: I think thank you want to thank you. Based on
Speaker 1: his previous work, it seems safe to say John to
Speaker 1: Touro is right. This is Alec Baldwin and you're listening
Speaker 1: to here's the thing