WEBVTT - Mark Harris on Mike Nichols’ Incomparable Life 0:00:02.240 --> 0:00:05.360 I'm Alec Baldwin and you're listening to Here's the Thing 0:00:05.840 --> 0:00:10.000 from My Heart Radio. Mike Nichols was one of the 0:00:10.039 --> 0:00:14.360 most celebrated directors of the last century, and he is 0:00:14.440 --> 0:00:18.119 the subject of a compelling new biography written by My 0:00:18.239 --> 0:00:22.400 guest Today, Mark Harris, drawn from more than two hundred 0:00:22.440 --> 0:00:27.040 and fifty interviews. Mike Nichols. A Life traces nichols lonely 0:00:27.040 --> 0:00:30.600 and difficult childhood onto the highs and lows of his 0:00:30.960 --> 0:00:36.479 astonishingly productive fifty year career. Nichols was the rare director 0:00:36.560 --> 0:00:41.360 who moved fluidly between Broadway and Hollywood. His films include 0:00:41.400 --> 0:00:45.600 The Graduate, Who's Afraid of Virginia, Wolf, Silkwood, and Working Girl, 0:00:45.960 --> 0:00:49.960 Where I had My chance to experience firsthand his ability 0:00:50.000 --> 0:00:54.880 to connect with actors on the stage. Nichols was prolific 0:00:54.960 --> 0:00:58.640 in shepherding the casts of everything from Neil Simon's Barefoot 0:00:58.640 --> 0:01:01.880 in the Park and Tom Stoppard's The Real Thing to 0:01:02.200 --> 0:01:05.560 Monty Python's Smam a Lot. And before all of that, 0:01:05.720 --> 0:01:09.800 Mike Nichols was a performer, one half of the influential 0:01:09.840 --> 0:01:13.120 sketch comedy team Nichols in May, which he developed with 0:01:13.200 --> 0:01:17.640 the incomparable Elaine May. One thing Mark Harris knew when 0:01:17.640 --> 0:01:20.560 he started working on this book was there would be 0:01:20.560 --> 0:01:25.440 plenty of material. I don't know how you wake up 0:01:25.480 --> 0:01:27.920 every day and go to bed every night with the 0:01:27.959 --> 0:01:31.720 same person in your head while you're working on something. 0:01:32.240 --> 0:01:35.559 And I just thought that with Nichols, whatever I found 0:01:35.600 --> 0:01:39.000 out good or bad, there probably would not be boring parts. 0:01:39.040 --> 0:01:42.039 I mean, he had such a long, interesting career and 0:01:42.520 --> 0:01:46.000 it was always on two tracks, movie directing and theater directing, 0:01:46.240 --> 0:01:48.480 and before that there was all of his work with 0:01:48.520 --> 0:01:50.920 Elaine May. So I thought, I'm not going to hit 0:01:51.080 --> 0:01:55.360 a whole decade where nothing interesting happens or I can't 0:01:55.360 --> 0:01:58.160 find out anything good. And I just felt like I 0:01:58.200 --> 0:02:00.400 would never be bored. And and I also I felt 0:02:00.600 --> 0:02:03.440 truly that there was that what I didn't know was 0:02:03.480 --> 0:02:05.960 a much much longer list than what I thought. I 0:02:06.040 --> 0:02:10.400 knew now. Diane and his children were not interviewed for 0:02:10.440 --> 0:02:13.280 the book. No, they weren't. I went to them before 0:02:13.520 --> 0:02:17.200 I really sat down with Penguin to try to make 0:02:17.240 --> 0:02:19.920 a deal, because I had no interest in doing the 0:02:19.919 --> 0:02:23.560 book if they were opposed to it. But they gave 0:02:23.600 --> 0:02:27.079 their consent. They never asked to see anything advanced. They 0:02:27.080 --> 0:02:29.760 never asked for me to leave anything out, So I 0:02:29.800 --> 0:02:33.440 felt like what I really needed from them was they're okay, 0:02:33.520 --> 0:02:36.480 and they're okay to make their okay public. When they 0:02:36.520 --> 0:02:39.360 don't agree to sit down, why don't they do it? 0:02:39.960 --> 0:02:42.800 I felt like, in different ways, it was a very 0:02:42.919 --> 0:02:47.520 big ask. Mike's three kids are pretty private people, and 0:02:47.880 --> 0:02:50.400 Mike made no secret of the fact that when they 0:02:50.400 --> 0:02:53.640 were growing up he wasn't always as present a father 0:02:53.760 --> 0:02:56.480 as he felt he should have been. And I really 0:02:56.560 --> 0:03:01.320 understand the idea of not wanting to play out a 0:03:01.400 --> 0:03:04.360 whole parent child drama in the pages of a book. 0:03:04.800 --> 0:03:08.880 Diane was in a uniquely complicated position because if she 0:03:09.000 --> 0:03:11.760 had sat down and done an interview with me, I 0:03:11.800 --> 0:03:16.440 think everyone would have taken that as tacit approval of 0:03:17.240 --> 0:03:20.440 everything that was in the book, which she could not give, 0:03:20.560 --> 0:03:23.080 of course, because she didn't know what was in the book. 0:03:23.280 --> 0:03:25.880 So they put a lot of trust in me letting 0:03:25.880 --> 0:03:28.280 me do this. Everybody that worked with Mike, he's such 0:03:28.320 --> 0:03:30.959 a fizzy character. I would imagine your work was made 0:03:31.040 --> 0:03:34.680 easier by how much people remember their time with Mike completely. 0:03:34.760 --> 0:03:37.160 That was a really particular thing, Even if he said 0:03:37.240 --> 0:03:40.400 something to them forty years ago. They held onto it. 0:03:40.840 --> 0:03:43.800 Whether it was a great funny piece of advice or 0:03:43.880 --> 0:03:47.440 a brutal insult, it stayed inside them when it went in. 0:03:47.640 --> 0:03:50.040 That's interesting. I didn't know Mike well. I worked with 0:03:50.120 --> 0:03:52.000 them that one time in the eighties, and but I 0:03:52.040 --> 0:03:53.800 would always see him. He was very kind and he 0:03:53.840 --> 0:03:56.120 loved actors. And it was at a time in my 0:03:56.200 --> 0:04:00.160 life when I was being tortured by a girlfriend I 0:04:00.280 --> 0:04:03.680 had like she was so resentful of my starting to 0:04:03.720 --> 0:04:06.120 work and being more successful. This is the beginning of 0:04:06.200 --> 0:04:09.800 me making films. This is the beginning of me throwing 0:04:09.840 --> 0:04:12.160 my clothes in a suitcase and leaving the moment after 0:04:12.200 --> 0:04:14.320 I hung up the phone, Hollywood was calling me to 0:04:14.360 --> 0:04:16.800 make movies and I was going to go no matter what. 0:04:17.279 --> 0:04:20.400 And you were gonna start missing everything, birthdays, anniversary as 0:04:20.400 --> 0:04:23.560 you didn't care. And I'm sitting lamenting this with Mike 0:04:24.200 --> 0:04:27.159 in his trailer when we were doing Working Girl, and 0:04:27.200 --> 0:04:29.680 he said to me, well, you know the relationship is dead. 0:04:29.720 --> 0:04:32.960 He said. There's two metrics. One is he says, there's 0:04:33.000 --> 0:04:35.599 just not enough other people in the room when you're 0:04:35.600 --> 0:04:37.880 with your girlfriend. They just aren't enough other people in 0:04:37.920 --> 0:04:41.320 the room. The other one is he says, how quickly 0:04:41.320 --> 0:04:43.760 do you get back into your ship after you come 0:04:47.120 --> 0:04:50.359 the thing to say, I mean, he really really like 0:04:50.520 --> 0:04:53.159 beguiled me. He was beguiling. Everything that came out of 0:04:53.160 --> 0:04:56.480 his mouth was smart and funny and rich. Well, I 0:04:56.520 --> 0:04:59.520 think you got him at a really interesting point in 0:04:59.600 --> 0:05:02.159 his life, not just because it was Working Girl, which 0:05:02.200 --> 0:05:04.160 of course is one of the movies that people still 0:05:04.400 --> 0:05:08.000 talk about and watch, but because he was on his 0:05:08.120 --> 0:05:12.680 way to marrying Diane. And I think at that point, 0:05:13.000 --> 0:05:16.400 you know, he had recovered from a big breakdown that 0:05:16.440 --> 0:05:18.600 he had had a couple of years earlier. He got 0:05:18.600 --> 0:05:22.280 addicted to halcyon and all of that, and he recovered, 0:05:22.480 --> 0:05:25.600 and Working Girl came along, and he said, it's too 0:05:25.640 --> 0:05:29.560 elaborate and location driven a production. I'm gonna make Biloxi 0:05:29.600 --> 0:05:31.440 Blues first, which is a movie that I can do 0:05:31.480 --> 0:05:34.040 in my sleep, and then I'll get my muscles back, 0:05:34.080 --> 0:05:35.800 and then I want to do Working Girl. But it 0:05:35.880 --> 0:05:39.200 was a point when he was trying to fix himself 0:05:39.360 --> 0:05:41.479 in some ways. You know, you go into your fourth 0:05:41.520 --> 0:05:45.200 marriage and obviously why the first three didn't work, and 0:05:45.240 --> 0:05:49.320 what your part was in that must be very front 0:05:49.360 --> 0:05:52.520 of mine. So I think you got him an unusually 0:05:52.680 --> 0:05:59.200 kind of vulnerable and tense and excited time in his life. 0:05:59.680 --> 0:06:02.680 There's up moment you have in the book which is 0:06:02.720 --> 0:06:05.440 just so thrilling about Fiffer. When Fifer leaves the room 0:06:05.480 --> 0:06:08.320 and comes back, he says, my god, he's dazzled by 0:06:08.320 --> 0:06:10.400 what Nichols does and he says, it's all in there. 0:06:10.960 --> 0:06:12.719 And that was the thing about Mike. If there's ten 0:06:12.800 --> 0:06:16.760 things you want, the average director has four, maybe five 0:06:17.000 --> 0:06:18.880 of the ten things you want, and Nichols, of course 0:06:18.920 --> 0:06:20.760 had all ten of those things. And because his mind 0:06:20.800 --> 0:06:23.200 was on everything. If he was talking to you about 0:06:23.200 --> 0:06:26.320 the scene. I remember vividly he was talking about the 0:06:26.360 --> 0:06:28.880 scene we were going to do, and I'm sitting on 0:06:28.920 --> 0:06:30.280 a bed and he's sitting on the bed, and as 0:06:30.320 --> 0:06:32.120 he's talking to me, he's looking over my shoulder. He says, 0:06:32.320 --> 0:06:34.279 what is this painting doing on the wall. He says, 0:06:34.320 --> 0:06:37.160 take this down, He says, I hate this painting. And 0:06:37.160 --> 0:06:39.400 they're like the set design is in his mind. It's 0:06:39.400 --> 0:06:42.880 all of one. I was really surprised when I was 0:06:42.920 --> 0:06:45.560 doing the research and interviews how many stories I heard 0:06:45.640 --> 0:06:51.120 in different contexts about Mike freaking out about some physical 0:06:51.600 --> 0:06:56.360 location or surroundings based thing. This really bothered him. There 0:06:56.360 --> 0:06:59.760 was one point when he had an entire Broadway set 0:06:59.800 --> 0:07:03.200 re built because a hallway that was on the stage 0:07:03.200 --> 0:07:06.200 in the center he decided was eight inches too narrow 0:07:06.480 --> 0:07:09.200 and that he needed those extra eight inches. There's another 0:07:09.240 --> 0:07:11.920 point when he's doing Who's Afraid of Virginia Wolf on 0:07:12.040 --> 0:07:15.120 stage with Elane May at the Long Wharf and they're 0:07:15.120 --> 0:07:18.920 in the living room set and he realizes that there 0:07:18.960 --> 0:07:21.880 are only three places to sit and there are four characters, 0:07:22.200 --> 0:07:25.520 and it he just completely blows a gasket. He completely 0:07:25.520 --> 0:07:28.400 freaks out. He can't let it go for days and days, 0:07:28.600 --> 0:07:32.520 and it was a really interesting kind of glimpse for 0:07:32.600 --> 0:07:36.000 me in what he needed in order to work now. 0:07:36.040 --> 0:07:40.000 You wrote a book about a battery of directors who 0:07:40.000 --> 0:07:43.280 were very influential in the seventies, as well as your 0:07:43.320 --> 0:07:45.840 other book about a battery of directors during the wartime. 0:07:46.400 --> 0:07:48.880 Nichols is someone who you really when you say his name, 0:07:49.160 --> 0:07:51.400 your heart pressed to think of anybody who was as 0:07:51.480 --> 0:07:55.880 adept at directing actors. There are directors who cast well, 0:07:56.560 --> 0:07:58.160 and they cast the prison and there's everything that just 0:07:58.200 --> 0:08:00.120 wind upup and let him go. You've come to do 0:08:00.240 --> 0:08:01.640 this thing I know you can do when I just 0:08:01.760 --> 0:08:03.640 let you go, do that and it puts a costume 0:08:03.680 --> 0:08:06.440 on you and we go. Whereas Mike really this idea, 0:08:06.680 --> 0:08:09.320 the vanity of certain directors who believe they quote unquote 0:08:09.360 --> 0:08:12.200 get a performance out of you is completely nonsense. But 0:08:12.280 --> 0:08:15.640 with Mike, it really was true. Mike got a performance 0:08:15.680 --> 0:08:17.400 out of you. Do you think that made him completely 0:08:17.440 --> 0:08:19.800 unique in the business. I do think it made him 0:08:19.800 --> 0:08:22.480 pretty unique. And I also think it's the reason that 0:08:22.800 --> 0:08:26.040 a lot of people have kind of had trouble pinning 0:08:26.280 --> 0:08:29.360 down what makes him special as a director. Because Mike 0:08:29.400 --> 0:08:32.560 didn't write his own movies. I mean that already sets 0:08:32.600 --> 0:08:34.400 him apart from a lot of the directors. Like when 0:08:34.400 --> 0:08:36.880 we talk about a Cohen Brothers movie or Paul Thomas 0:08:36.960 --> 0:08:40.320 Anderson movie or a Tarantino movie. We know where he's 0:08:40.360 --> 0:08:42.800 coming from as a writer as much as we do 0:08:42.880 --> 0:08:47.040 as a director. But if Mike's really special gift was 0:08:47.800 --> 0:08:49.880 connecting with each actor in a way that was going 0:08:49.880 --> 0:08:53.000 to bring the best performance out of them. If that works, 0:08:53.800 --> 0:08:56.960 that is sort of something that it's supposed to end 0:08:57.040 --> 0:08:59.240 up being invisible, Like You're not supposed to watch the 0:08:59.280 --> 0:09:03.839 movie and think, oh, that's a impeccably directed performance. You're 0:09:03.840 --> 0:09:06.040 supposed to watch the movie and think that's a great performance. 0:09:06.120 --> 0:09:08.440 And so I think the thing that made him special 0:09:09.040 --> 0:09:12.440 is something that isn't always evident to people who watch 0:09:12.520 --> 0:09:15.000 his movies. But what's interesting is that he did do 0:09:15.120 --> 0:09:17.200 a lot of writing. I mean, he was right in 0:09:17.240 --> 0:09:22.160 there with Piffer and Simon and other writers giving them 0:09:22.240 --> 0:09:25.200 his ideas about cuts. I mean, decorating the house is 0:09:25.240 --> 0:09:28.360 one thing, Building the house is another. And Mike didn't 0:09:28.400 --> 0:09:31.400 build the house. He didn't write the pieces, but he contributed. 0:09:31.559 --> 0:09:33.440 Why do you think he never wrote his own stuff 0:09:33.480 --> 0:09:37.360 for motion pictures. Well, some people say that it was 0:09:37.960 --> 0:09:40.720 because he was uncomfortable from the beginning of his life 0:09:40.760 --> 0:09:44.200 with literal writing, Like he hated his handwriting. He didn't 0:09:44.240 --> 0:09:47.520 like putting things down on paper. And of course there's 0:09:47.559 --> 0:09:51.200 the interesting thing about his work with Elaine May, which 0:09:51.280 --> 0:09:53.880 is that all of the most famous sketches that they 0:09:53.880 --> 0:09:56.600 did together, some of which they did hundreds of times, 0:09:56.760 --> 0:09:59.440 were never actually written down. They were just things that 0:09:59.480 --> 0:10:02.840 were work doubt between the two of them until every 0:10:02.880 --> 0:10:05.920 word was locked. But it was never locked on paper. 0:10:05.920 --> 0:10:10.000 It was just locked in their performance. They were too childish. 0:10:10.080 --> 0:10:12.360 That quote you have where she says they talked about 0:10:12.400 --> 0:10:13.960 they don't want to break up anymore on the show, 0:10:14.000 --> 0:10:16.320 and she says it's so childish, and she says, she 0:10:16.320 --> 0:10:20.199 said it was the most responsible conversation we'd ever had. Yeah, 0:10:20.240 --> 0:10:22.880 I love that story so much that there there are 0:10:22.880 --> 0:10:26.160 these two people in there I guess late twenties by 0:10:26.240 --> 0:10:28.640 that point, saying we have to stop laughing on this 0:10:28.720 --> 0:10:31.640 Broadway stage. People are paying to see this, and they 0:10:31.720 --> 0:10:34.760 couldn't keep it together. They really didn't think of it 0:10:34.840 --> 0:10:41.760 as a grown up job that they had. Author Mark Harris. 0:10:42.440 --> 0:10:45.960 If you love behind the scenes stories of Hollywood legends, 0:10:46.440 --> 0:10:49.720 check out my conversation with Sam Wasson, author of The 0:10:49.800 --> 0:10:54.319 Big Goodbye Chinatown and The Last Years of Hollywood. Wasson 0:10:54.440 --> 0:10:57.240 spent a lot of time with producer Robert Evans, who 0:10:57.320 --> 0:11:01.199 was credited with turning Paramount Studio Is around in the 0:11:01.200 --> 0:11:05.160 early nineties seventies. He loved it, he loved it, he 0:11:05.280 --> 0:11:09.160 loved show business, he loved movies, he loved people, he 0:11:09.400 --> 0:11:14.280 loved talent. It's actually that simple. I asked him this question. 0:11:14.320 --> 0:11:17.160 I said, Evans. Is it as simple as you bet 0:11:17.160 --> 0:11:20.440 on talent? Do you have an easy job? And he said, 0:11:20.720 --> 0:11:26.320 you goddamn right, that was and it's true. Here more 0:11:26.480 --> 0:11:30.000 of my conversation with author Sam wasson that Here's the 0:11:30.040 --> 0:11:34.080 Thing dot Org. After the break, Mark Harris talks about 0:11:34.080 --> 0:11:38.400 a fundamental truth of Hollywood. Success has a way of 0:11:38.440 --> 0:11:52.600 limiting your choices. I'm Alec Baldwin and you're listening to 0:11:52.760 --> 0:11:56.520 Here's the Thing. Mike Nichols was known for bringing out 0:11:56.559 --> 0:12:01.280 remarkable performances from his actors, but not always. Two stories 0:12:01.440 --> 0:12:04.360 of when Nichols struggled stood out to me and Mark 0:12:04.440 --> 0:12:08.960 Harris's biography, nichols frustration with Gary Shandling as the lead 0:12:09.000 --> 0:12:12.040 in What Planet Are You From? And his decision to 0:12:12.120 --> 0:12:16.280 fire Mandy Patakon just a week into rehearsals for Heartburn, 0:12:16.679 --> 0:12:20.080 a role that went to Jack Nicholson instead. It's so 0:12:20.200 --> 0:12:23.200 interesting to me. I mean, Mike did know how important 0:12:23.240 --> 0:12:25.800 casting was, and yet the list of actors that he 0:12:25.840 --> 0:12:28.800 fired over the decades is really pretty impressive. It's like 0:12:28.880 --> 0:12:32.320 Gene Hackman, Robert de Niro and in that case, Mandy Pottakin. 0:12:32.800 --> 0:12:35.600 I know that Mike was very impressed by his work 0:12:35.640 --> 0:12:38.320 on stage, and that was a moment when he was 0:12:38.360 --> 0:12:40.679 really coming up. He was a big deal on Broadway, 0:12:40.960 --> 0:12:44.880 and Mike often felt that could carry over. I mean, 0:12:45.120 --> 0:12:47.560 he would fill out the supporting cast of his movies 0:12:47.600 --> 0:12:49.520 a lot of the time with people he had seen 0:12:49.679 --> 0:12:52.840 on Broadway or off Broadway because he knew they could deliver. Yeah, 0:12:52.880 --> 0:12:55.720 he even flew them to Texas when he was doing Silkwood. 0:12:56.000 --> 0:13:00.360 But that's different, obviously than casting a romantic leading man 0:13:00.400 --> 0:13:04.040 opposite Meryl Streep. I mean, so it could have been 0:13:04.040 --> 0:13:06.720 the jewishness, it could have been that he just felt 0:13:06.760 --> 0:13:10.000 a good connection with that character. But whatever it was, 0:13:10.280 --> 0:13:15.680 clearly it was something that he Nichols decided pretty early 0:13:15.760 --> 0:13:18.679 on was a wrong call. I mean, they shot for 0:13:18.720 --> 0:13:22.440 a week before he fired Mandy Patinkin, but it sounded 0:13:22.480 --> 0:13:24.800 to me like even before that, in the read throughs, 0:13:24.840 --> 0:13:28.400 in the rehearsals, Nichols had a really strong sense that 0:13:28.640 --> 0:13:33.320 it was not going well on a character level and 0:13:33.400 --> 0:13:36.680 maybe not going so well on a personal level. Meryl 0:13:36.760 --> 0:13:39.760 said that Mandy was very rabbinical in his questioning and 0:13:39.800 --> 0:13:42.839 then his character development. Right, I loved that word. That's 0:13:42.840 --> 0:13:44.680 exactly what she said. She said he was rabbinical, that 0:13:44.720 --> 0:13:48.320 he had to kind of interrogate everything about the character, 0:13:48.400 --> 0:13:50.640 maybe even to the point of torturing people a little. 0:13:50.840 --> 0:13:52.880 But one thing that seemed to come up a lot, 0:13:53.000 --> 0:13:55.080 and I can understand how this would be a sticking 0:13:55.120 --> 0:13:58.880 point was he kept saying, I don't understand this. Why 0:13:58.880 --> 0:14:01.320 would a man ever cheat on his wife? Why would 0:14:01.360 --> 0:14:03.920 a man ever cheat on his pregnant wife? And heartburn 0:14:04.040 --> 0:14:06.600 was obviously like the facts of the case, we're not 0:14:06.679 --> 0:14:09.560 in dispute. It's based on this real thing that happened 0:14:09.559 --> 0:14:12.920 between carlburn Steen and or Evran. So I think there 0:14:12.960 --> 0:14:15.480 was a feeling that at some point we got to 0:14:15.520 --> 0:14:19.120 get off the y and just move on to it happened. 0:14:19.600 --> 0:14:22.400 So you have to figure out why this like this 0:14:22.440 --> 0:14:25.000 guy did this, and that's what you have to play. 0:14:25.360 --> 0:14:28.160 I love how you write. When Nicholson comes on the project, 0:14:28.320 --> 0:14:31.240 he says, Mike, if you need me, I'm there, and 0:14:31.240 --> 0:14:33.880 then later on they interpreted Mike, if you need me, 0:14:35.040 --> 0:14:37.600 what he meant was if you need me, which is 0:14:37.680 --> 0:14:40.880 means an eight million dollar price ticket, I'm there. Well, 0:14:40.920 --> 0:14:43.520 I was just gonna say that decision just completely changed 0:14:43.560 --> 0:14:46.360 the budget of the movie. Heartburn was not an expensive movie, 0:14:46.360 --> 0:14:48.800 and it turned into a much more expensive movie the 0:14:48.840 --> 0:14:51.760 second Nicholson came on board, but he did it with 0:14:51.880 --> 0:14:54.960 very few days. Notice, well, you know, Mike decides that 0:14:55.000 --> 0:14:57.400 in order to have the Hollywood career he wants to 0:14:57.400 --> 0:14:59.800 have in the budgets and get paid what he wants 0:14:59.840 --> 0:15:03.840 to paid. The budgets inflate in direct proportion to Mike's 0:15:03.880 --> 0:15:08.920 salary inflating. If Mike's salary becomes six seven eight million dollars, 0:15:09.120 --> 0:15:13.440 the budget goes from fifty sixty five million dollars, and 0:15:13.520 --> 0:15:16.640 that the canoe tips over. In terms of casting, you 0:15:16.760 --> 0:15:19.200 have to have the star. We go, we're gonna get 0:15:19.240 --> 0:15:22.440 less creative maybe about who should play the part, and 0:15:22.440 --> 0:15:24.200 we're gonna start talking about who we need to play 0:15:24.240 --> 0:15:26.560 the part to sell tickets. And I wonder if you 0:15:26.640 --> 0:15:31.000 felt that he ever express any anxiety or regret about 0:15:31.040 --> 0:15:33.200 the fact that, in order to make big ticket movies 0:15:33.400 --> 0:15:36.240 he couldn't cast who he wanted in the film. Well, 0:15:36.320 --> 0:15:38.400 I don't know if it turned into a casting thing, 0:15:38.440 --> 0:15:41.960 but probably the worst example of a movie where his 0:15:42.600 --> 0:15:45.960 ask his fee changed the whole nature of the movie 0:15:46.200 --> 0:15:48.720 was what planeted Are You from? The comedy he made 0:15:48.760 --> 0:15:53.280 with Gary Sandling, because everyone who wrote that movie, which 0:15:53.480 --> 0:15:55.400 seems like a pretty long list of people when you 0:15:55.800 --> 0:15:57.960 add everyone who took a crack at the script and 0:15:57.960 --> 0:16:00.760 and even people who were in it, like and At Benning, 0:16:00.840 --> 0:16:04.120 said this was this really should have been a small movie. 0:16:04.200 --> 0:16:08.040 There should have been an indie style, Charlie Kaufman, quirky 0:16:08.080 --> 0:16:12.160 little comedy, and instead I think it becomes maybe with 0:16:12.240 --> 0:16:16.160 the exception of Primary Colors, the biggest fee that Mike 0:16:16.240 --> 0:16:18.920 ever got for a movie. In the minute you're paying 0:16:18.960 --> 0:16:22.400 someone like Mike Nichols eight million dollars in the nineties 0:16:22.440 --> 0:16:25.360 to direct a movie, suddenly it becomes a completely different 0:16:25.440 --> 0:16:27.960 kind of movie. So what planet are you from? Turned 0:16:28.000 --> 0:16:31.560 into this movie with big sets and special effects and 0:16:31.560 --> 0:16:35.600 and sort of elaborate costumes and kind of heaviness of 0:16:35.800 --> 0:16:40.400 production value that crushed the comedy under its weight. And 0:16:40.600 --> 0:16:43.680 I think that was the only time where money actually 0:16:44.280 --> 0:16:46.720 did damage in a kind of material way to a 0:16:46.720 --> 0:16:48.960 movie that Mike was making. I mean, he did get 0:16:48.960 --> 0:16:52.680 a lot of money for Primary Colors, but Primary Colors 0:16:52.720 --> 0:16:54.720 was probably always going to be a movie where you 0:16:54.800 --> 0:16:57.640 wanted to see a couple of stars play those parts. 0:16:57.680 --> 0:17:00.120 When you're doing a movie about a potential president and 0:17:00.200 --> 0:17:03.760 first lady, you want to see big names, And in 0:17:03.800 --> 0:17:06.639 that case, to Mike's credit, he did resist. You know, 0:17:06.680 --> 0:17:10.200 there was a lot of pressure to turn the main character, 0:17:10.359 --> 0:17:14.880 the narrator of the novel Primary Colors, who was African 0:17:14.920 --> 0:17:17.560 American on the page, into a white character. People were 0:17:17.600 --> 0:17:20.159 openly saying, like, why don't you give this to Michael J. Fox. 0:17:20.280 --> 0:17:23.000 This is a perfect part for him, And Mike resisted 0:17:23.040 --> 0:17:26.119 that and actually cast an unknown actor, Adrian Lester in 0:17:26.160 --> 0:17:28.200 the part. So I don't think there are too many 0:17:28.240 --> 0:17:31.080 cases where money got in the way of him casting 0:17:31.080 --> 0:17:33.040 a movie the right way. I mean, I know that 0:17:33.119 --> 0:17:35.399 on Working Girl there was a lot of back and 0:17:35.440 --> 0:17:39.040 forth with the studio right about whether they could afford 0:17:39.560 --> 0:17:42.919 two stars in the leading part or they wanted Melanie 0:17:42.920 --> 0:17:44.959 and I to play the two leads, right, And then 0:17:44.960 --> 0:17:46.320 he said, and he said to me point there was 0:17:46.400 --> 0:17:48.600 one of my favorite conversation with Mike. He said, if 0:17:48.640 --> 0:17:50.240 I put you in Melanie in the leads, where they're 0:17:50.240 --> 0:17:52.480 gonna give me twenty million dollars to make my movie, 0:17:52.880 --> 0:17:54.479 and if I cast these other people, they're gonna give 0:17:54.520 --> 0:17:56.720 me fifty million dollars to make my movie. She said, 0:17:56.720 --> 0:17:58.639 I hope you don't mind, but I'm gonna have to 0:17:58.680 --> 0:18:00.199 go with them in order to make my That was 0:18:00.240 --> 0:18:03.880 one of my first indoctrinations into that. And meaning there's 0:18:03.880 --> 0:18:06.200 a metric, there's an arithmetic to this, which is there's 0:18:06.240 --> 0:18:08.120 just nothing I can do about it. I can't make 0:18:08.160 --> 0:18:10.760 my movie for twenty million dollars. And he said, would 0:18:10.800 --> 0:18:13.080 you play this other part? Would you play this smaller? 0:18:13.119 --> 0:18:14.280 I said, you got. I mean I just wanted to 0:18:14.280 --> 0:18:16.800 be around him and work with him. I once said 0:18:16.800 --> 0:18:19.880 to someone, Travolta is the last movie star in the timeline, 0:18:19.880 --> 0:18:21.760 mean that old movie stars after that are all about 0:18:21.760 --> 0:18:24.840 effects and guns and cars and computer generating, and that 0:18:24.920 --> 0:18:28.760 the star of themselves is the hood ornament on a vehicle. 0:18:29.800 --> 0:18:32.760 Travolta is a very old school movie star in terms 0:18:32.760 --> 0:18:34.760 of you build the movie around what he can do 0:18:35.840 --> 0:18:38.040 you and if you don't make the movie built around 0:18:38.040 --> 0:18:40.680 what he can do as primary colors, you suffer because 0:18:40.760 --> 0:18:44.560 he's not really right for that role. And in my mind, well, 0:18:44.600 --> 0:18:47.480 and he was the second choice. I mean, Mike really 0:18:47.520 --> 0:18:50.119 wanted Tom Hanks for that part, and it sounded to 0:18:50.160 --> 0:18:53.919 me like he came actually quite close to getting Tom Hanks, 0:18:53.920 --> 0:18:56.960 and then Hanks backed away. Some people said because he 0:18:57.000 --> 0:18:59.520 didn't want to offend the Clinton's I read that when 0:18:59.560 --> 0:19:01.640 Hanks said to me, was I thought of myself as 0:19:01.880 --> 0:19:06.240 an old young man but still not quite old enough 0:19:06.280 --> 0:19:08.480 to play a president. Well, someone said that to me. 0:19:08.560 --> 0:19:09.840 Was They said, oh, if you do that part in 0:19:09.880 --> 0:19:11.760 that movie, they go, you'll be middle aged for the 0:19:11.760 --> 0:19:14.920 rest of your life. And then you also write about 0:19:14.960 --> 0:19:19.720 how the timing of the Clinton scandal and the film collide. Yeah. 0:19:19.760 --> 0:19:22.040 I had kind of forgotten that. I knew that they 0:19:22.040 --> 0:19:25.240 were intermingled, but I didn't remember that we're talking about 0:19:25.359 --> 0:19:29.000 two separate scandals. That the Primary Colors was really springing 0:19:29.000 --> 0:19:32.879 off the Jennifer Flowers story, and then in the middle 0:19:32.920 --> 0:19:36.560 of it, the Monica Lewinsky story breaks. Yeah, I mean 0:19:36.800 --> 0:19:39.919 a story that makes Primary Colors suddenly looks quite a 0:19:40.000 --> 0:19:44.040 children's book, right exactly. And um, Emma Thompson, this speaks 0:19:44.040 --> 0:19:47.720 to Travolta's stardom. Emma Thompson tells a really funny story 0:19:47.720 --> 0:19:50.360 about the moment they all found out, which is they 0:19:50.359 --> 0:19:53.760 were sitting around and Emma Thompson said, Mike and I 0:19:53.800 --> 0:19:56.080 were reading, you know, rice and beans out of all 0:19:56.119 --> 0:19:58.760 the starring containers, and John Travolta had like a seventy 0:19:58.800 --> 0:20:02.199 five course chef's meal. He had his own chef on 0:20:02.240 --> 0:20:04.800 the set, And I thought that was like, of all 0:20:04.880 --> 0:20:08.880 the star indulgences, that struck me as one that like Mike, 0:20:08.920 --> 0:20:11.720 would be the most forgiving of because he loved food 0:20:11.800 --> 0:20:15.960 so much. What's rehearsal without donuts? Right from Barefoot in 0:20:16.000 --> 0:20:18.320 the Park. So it happened a couple of times in 0:20:18.320 --> 0:20:22.280 Mike's life that this thing just from out of left 0:20:22.320 --> 0:20:25.760 field kind of derailed a movie at the last minute. 0:20:25.800 --> 0:20:28.800 Once was Catch twenny two when they saw Mash just 0:20:28.840 --> 0:20:31.240 a couple of months before Catch twenny two was supposed 0:20:31.240 --> 0:20:33.800 to open and realized that Match was going to take 0:20:33.840 --> 0:20:36.600 the entire audience that they were hoping to get and 0:20:36.680 --> 0:20:39.240 Catch twenty two. And the other was Primary Colors, where 0:20:39.320 --> 0:20:41.560 they all said, I don't really know what's going to 0:20:41.640 --> 0:20:43.560 happen to the movie, but they knew what was going 0:20:43.600 --> 0:20:45.240 to happen to the movie. They knew that it was 0:20:45.520 --> 0:20:48.440 totally eclipsed by the scandal, right, And when you read 0:20:48.640 --> 0:20:50.520 the reviews of it at the time, some of them 0:20:50.560 --> 0:20:53.720 even say explicitly, like we see this on the news 0:20:53.760 --> 0:20:56.680 every night, and this movie feels like it's about something 0:20:56.720 --> 0:20:59.199 that happened two years ago, and nobody's mind is on 0:20:59.320 --> 0:21:01.600 that anymore. I got a little choked up reading this 0:21:01.640 --> 0:21:04.280 book because it's like you get to those forks in 0:21:04.280 --> 0:21:06.399 the road of career versus personal life, and you have 0:21:06.400 --> 0:21:08.119 to say to yourself, am I willing to do what 0:21:08.160 --> 0:21:10.440 it takes for some people? The answer to that question 0:21:10.520 --> 0:21:13.639 is very easy. I mean, it's just reflective that they 0:21:13.720 --> 0:21:16.400 when you're offered that opportunity. I remember when I would 0:21:16.400 --> 0:21:18.879