WEBVTT - Elaine Stritch - Summer Staff Picks 0:00:00.560 --> 0:00:03.320 This is Alec Baldwin, and you were listening to Here's 0:00:03.360 --> 0:00:07.640 the Thing from iHeart Radio. It's summer, and that means 0:00:07.680 --> 0:00:10.520 it's time for our tradition at Here's the Thing, where 0:00:10.520 --> 0:00:14.480 the staff share their favorite episodes from our archives in 0:00:14.520 --> 0:00:19.239 our Summer Staff Picks series. Next up is producer Maureen Hoban. 0:00:20.160 --> 0:00:24.120 Thanks Alec. When I think of women who unapologetically speak 0:00:24.160 --> 0:00:27.960 their minds and are bubbling over with humor and talent, 0:00:28.600 --> 0:00:32.360 of course I think of Elaine Stretch. She was known 0:00:32.400 --> 0:00:37.040 for playing bold and body females, including that of Colleen Donneghe, 0:00:37.320 --> 0:00:40.360 mother to Alex's character on Thirty Rock. It was a 0:00:40.360 --> 0:00:45.559 delicious role where she effortlessly eviscerated the vice president of 0:00:45.680 --> 0:00:50.840 East Coast Television and Microwave Oven Programming at every turn. 0:00:51.840 --> 0:00:55.720 Elayne Stretch sadly passed away in twenty fourteen, a year 0:00:55.760 --> 0:00:59.840 after this recording, but in it you'll experience the sharp wit, 0:01:00.360 --> 0:01:05.479 unfiltered candor, and unmatched presence of the legendary first Lady 0:01:05.480 --> 0:01:07.440 of Broadway, Elaine Stretch. 0:01:12.080 --> 0:01:16.360 Actress Elaine Stretch has been performing for nearly seventy years. 0:01:16.840 --> 0:01:19.880 No matter the medium, she brings her characters to life. 0:01:20.160 --> 0:01:24.240 With a playful ferocity that naturally leads to scene stealing performances. 0:01:24.800 --> 0:01:28.760 Despite her enviable career in film and television, Elaine Stritch 0:01:28.840 --> 0:01:32.200 is a self professed Broadway baby. A big break came 0:01:32.240 --> 0:01:35.399 in nineteen fifty when she was hired to understudy ethel 0:01:35.480 --> 0:01:38.520 Merman in Irving Berlin's musical Call Me Madam. 0:01:38.840 --> 0:01:40.160 She scared me to death. 0:01:40.240 --> 0:01:41.360 Really, she's a tough brag. 0:01:41.480 --> 0:01:43.720 Oh. When I got to the end of Call Me Madam, 0:01:44.040 --> 0:01:44.440 it was. 0:01:44.440 --> 0:01:47.160 Mine on me madaises. 0:01:47.800 --> 0:01:53.600 It is not so surprises that you feel very strange. 0:01:53.320 --> 0:01:53.680 But not. 0:01:55.360 --> 0:01:58.480 Elaine Stretch remained on stage for much of the fifties 0:01:58.520 --> 0:02:02.160 and sixties, playing such iconic roles as Martha in Who's 0:02:02.200 --> 0:02:05.520 Afraid of Virginia Woolf, both Vera and Mame in the 0:02:05.600 --> 0:02:09.400 musical Mame, and Amanda in Private Lives by Noel Coward. 0:02:09.880 --> 0:02:12.880 In nineteen seventy, she originated what was arguably the role 0:02:12.919 --> 0:02:17.720 of her career, the acerbic Joanne in Stephen Sondheim's Company. 0:02:17.639 --> 0:02:21.720 And Here's to the Girls who just watched, Aren't They 0:02:21.880 --> 0:02:23.040 the Best? 0:02:23.400 --> 0:02:26.840 In a TV documentary about the cast recording of that production, 0:02:27.280 --> 0:02:31.760 we meet Elaine's toughest critic herself. Here she is listening 0:02:31.760 --> 0:02:34.800 to a take of that song she made famous, Ladies 0:02:34.919 --> 0:02:41.000 Who Lunch. 0:02:39.320 --> 0:02:46.600 As every Boy Row, And of course I'm smoking a 0:02:46.680 --> 0:02:49.160 nice cigarette, which helped the situation. 0:02:52.639 --> 0:02:55.600 Just to be clear, that's Elaine yelling at the sound 0:02:55.600 --> 0:02:58.600 of her own voice. That was over forty years ago. 0:02:58.680 --> 0:03:02.480 But Elaine Stritch has continue to hold herself to impossibly 0:03:02.600 --> 0:03:07.040 high standards, and she stayed busy, at least until recently. 0:03:07.600 --> 0:03:10.799 Earlier this year, she announced that she was leaving New 0:03:10.880 --> 0:03:14.000 York for her home state of Michigan. In April, at 0:03:14.040 --> 0:03:17.880 age eighty eight, Elaine Stritch performed her last cabaret show 0:03:18.280 --> 0:03:19.560 at the Carlisle Hotel. 0:03:20.120 --> 0:03:25.120 About a month ago. I really said, I'm I want 0:03:25.160 --> 0:03:27.800 out of here. I want out of New York. I 0:03:27.840 --> 0:03:30.120 don't I shouldn't live in New York anymore. It's not 0:03:30.320 --> 0:03:35.080 for me anymore. It's too fast for me. Or no, 0:03:35.120 --> 0:03:37.680 it's not too fast. And I changed my mind about that. 0:03:38.080 --> 0:03:41.560 It's not this, It's not that, it's just not for me. 0:03:41.960 --> 0:03:46.720 This is New York taxi lo and it's dinner and 0:03:46.800 --> 0:03:48.680 tonight and tomorrow in. 0:03:48.760 --> 0:03:51.520 Three full day and I can't. 0:03:51.080 --> 0:03:54.280 Handle it because I'm not interested in handling. 0:03:54.960 --> 0:03:56.240 You just don't want you could do it, You just 0:03:56.240 --> 0:03:57.520 don't want to do it. 0:03:57.560 --> 0:04:00.960 Doesn't give me any satisfaction. I don't go home and say, 0:04:01.040 --> 0:04:03.800 I guess I told them. 0:04:03.920 --> 0:04:07.120 So about a month ago. It had been an idea, 0:04:07.680 --> 0:04:09.560 and then a month ago you went, I'm doing it. 0:04:10.040 --> 0:04:13.840 I called up my nephew, who is a great buddy 0:04:13.880 --> 0:04:18.360 of mine in Birmingham, Michigan, and I said, I'm coming home. 0:04:19.279 --> 0:04:20.520 What do you think you're going to do there? 0:04:21.880 --> 0:04:23.040 Oh, you have no idea. 0:04:23.360 --> 0:04:25.919 I'm just saying a very active life. 0:04:25.960 --> 0:04:28.840 First of all, nothing. I'm really going to do nothing. 0:04:29.160 --> 0:04:32.080 I'm going to wake up and go back to bed 0:04:32.200 --> 0:04:34.240 and go back to bed. That's exactly right. 0:04:34.279 --> 0:04:35.000 That's what I want to do. 0:04:35.240 --> 0:04:37.120 I want to do it. I want to sleep a lot. 0:04:37.279 --> 0:04:39.360 What's wrong with us? I would like to wake up 0:04:39.400 --> 0:04:42.479 and have my oatmeal and read the paper and go 0:04:42.560 --> 0:04:46.000 right back to it, right back to bed until about noon. 0:04:46.839 --> 0:04:52.160 So you're going to go there and do nothing. 0:04:51.680 --> 0:04:55.440 And I like to go to dinner. I like to 0:04:55.520 --> 0:05:00.440 meet my nieces, my nephews, my cousins, my you know. 0:05:00.480 --> 0:05:04.039 Your relations there by way of who you're really two sisters, 0:05:04.240 --> 0:05:05.280 your two sisters. 0:05:05.400 --> 0:05:08.159 I had two sisters, were three sisters. I was the 0:05:08.200 --> 0:05:12.200 baby and they and all the. 0:05:12.200 --> 0:05:15.200 Kids in bedroom Detroit. You were in like what Bloomfield 0:05:15.240 --> 0:05:18.240 Hills or yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah your dad. But your 0:05:18.279 --> 0:05:19.760 dad was someone not in the car business. 0:05:20.880 --> 0:05:24.599 Daddy was, well, yes he was. He was the BF 0:05:24.640 --> 0:05:25.600 Goodrich rubber. He was. 0:05:25.839 --> 0:05:26.400 He was in the time. 0:05:26.480 --> 0:05:29.239 My mother called it the g d BF good Rich. 0:05:29.120 --> 0:05:30.520 Rubber, the goddamn BF. 0:05:30.760 --> 0:05:31.400 You got it. 0:05:31.960 --> 0:05:34.160 What are your two sisters? What kind of lives did 0:05:34.160 --> 0:05:35.400 they have? No show business? 0:05:35.520 --> 0:05:42.400 Very very chic, very normal. Normal. Georgie had four kids 0:05:42.400 --> 0:05:43.520 and Sally had three. 0:05:44.000 --> 0:05:46.000 So you have seven, yeah, he said. 0:05:46.200 --> 0:05:49.720 Seven guys running around and they're all crazy about me. 0:05:49.760 --> 0:05:53.800 Why shouldn't I go home? There's nothing to tie me here. 0:05:54.720 --> 0:05:55.440 It's not the same. 0:05:55.600 --> 0:06:01.080 My career tied me here. I talk career talk and 0:06:01.880 --> 0:06:03.680 play and plan and plan. 0:06:03.560 --> 0:06:05.240 And make plan. What am I doing next? What am 0:06:05.240 --> 0:06:05.880 I doing next? 0:06:05.920 --> 0:06:06.400 That's right? 0:06:06.560 --> 0:06:09.839 And when you get off that merry ground, it gets 0:06:09.880 --> 0:06:11.120 you get a different stop. 0:06:11.320 --> 0:06:13.960 Oh what to stop? It is the merry go round 0:06:14.040 --> 0:06:14.679 broke down? 0:06:15.400 --> 0:06:20.640 Why do you say that you could keep working? You 0:06:20.680 --> 0:06:21.200 don't want to. 0:06:21.920 --> 0:06:24.560 No, I don't want to find parts and look for 0:06:24.640 --> 0:06:30.359 him and I said the other night, when is pretend 0:06:30.600 --> 0:06:31.280 going to end? 0:06:31.920 --> 0:06:32.080 Right? 0:06:33.600 --> 0:06:38.120 Slowly but surely, alex Is I'm starting to say I 0:06:38.160 --> 0:06:40.760 don't want to pretend anymore. I want to get up 0:06:40.760 --> 0:06:42.640 in the morning and I want it to be real. 0:06:43.200 --> 0:06:44.200 I don't want to. 0:06:44.480 --> 0:06:47.680 I can't believe you're saying this, because it's so I am. 0:06:47.800 --> 0:06:51.239 It's so much. Maybe as a result of my getting older. 0:06:51.279 --> 0:06:54.039 I turned fifty five a couple of weeks ago, and 0:06:54.120 --> 0:06:56.600 my wife I got married again, and my wife were 0:06:56.640 --> 0:06:59.200 having a baby. And because of all this stuff, I 0:06:59.279 --> 0:07:02.760 realize I want to be me for a change. I 0:07:02.800 --> 0:07:04.279 want to wake up and I want to say my 0:07:04.400 --> 0:07:07.640 words and have my thought or not say anything. It's 0:07:07.680 --> 0:07:10.320 such a self involvement. 0:07:09.840 --> 0:07:11.840 This business work, it is it is. 0:07:11.960 --> 0:07:15.120 Why do you think you've lasted this long? You know 0:07:15.160 --> 0:07:17.760 what talent is? Why have you lasted all this time? 0:07:17.840 --> 0:07:20.520 And because you're talented? Certainly It isn't because people think 0:07:20.520 --> 0:07:21.960 you're an easy time of it. 0:07:22.440 --> 0:07:26.600 Because I have to accomplish something in that department almost 0:07:26.640 --> 0:07:27.679 every day of my life. 0:07:27.760 --> 0:07:30.680 I have to You've never stopped trying to prove yourself. 0:07:31.920 --> 0:07:32.760 That's the key, isn't it. 0:07:32.920 --> 0:07:35.320 No, I got to go and do that part in 0:07:35.480 --> 0:07:39.080 that soap, in that schmope. I don't care what it is. 0:07:39.600 --> 0:07:40.440 You got to give it everything. 0:07:41.240 --> 0:07:45.200 Or I'm with Noel Coward on the West End, or 0:07:45.240 --> 0:07:49.640 I'm with Hal Prince on Broadway. I'm with all the big, big, 0:07:49.720 --> 0:07:53.960 big big shots, and they're directing me well and guiding 0:07:54.000 --> 0:07:56.120 me well. And I'm I'm. 0:07:56.000 --> 0:07:57.640 You going to prove you belong there with them? 0:07:57.760 --> 0:08:00.920 Yes, And I'm being directed in the world way of 0:08:01.640 --> 0:08:05.800 the big shots, and I'm doing fine. I'm doing fine. 0:08:05.880 --> 0:08:07.640 I'm I'm I'm doing fine. 0:08:07.680 --> 0:08:10.800 Would you? But there's a point, I'm assuming when did 0:08:10.840 --> 0:08:11.960 you feel that you're in the room and all of 0:08:11.960 --> 0:08:13.920 a sudden it's like, I don't need anybody's advice. I 0:08:14.000 --> 0:08:15.640 know what I want to do. Here's what I do. 0:08:16.760 --> 0:08:18.480 Was there a time you remember in your life when 0:08:18.480 --> 0:08:19.160 that changed? 0:08:21.560 --> 0:08:26.280 I got self satisfied about the parts that I played. 0:08:27.000 --> 0:08:31.800 For example, well, like I was the I was the funny, 0:08:32.000 --> 0:08:37.320 kind of offbeat girl. I wasn't. I was never the 0:08:37.480 --> 0:08:42.080 romantic lead. I wasn't good that kind of looking girl 0:08:42.320 --> 0:08:45.160 in the movies. I couldn't be that kind of looking 0:08:45.240 --> 0:08:46.800 girl I was. 0:08:47.400 --> 0:08:49.079 Well, you could you could have been looks Wise, but 0:08:49.160 --> 0:08:50.840 you just don't want to play it because those were 0:08:50.880 --> 0:08:53.880 dull parts. Well, yeah, they weren't as good as parts. 0:08:54.000 --> 0:08:57.640 But I yeah, you were a sassier woman. Yeah, and 0:08:57.679 --> 0:08:58.520 you played those. 0:08:58.360 --> 0:09:01.000 Parts an attention getter when I didn't want to be 0:09:01.080 --> 0:09:02.880 eve Arden? I really didn't. 0:09:03.000 --> 0:09:05.360 Okay, Okay, that's a good point. Why. 0:09:05.720 --> 0:09:08.040 Well, because I don't want to be a funny girl 0:09:08.160 --> 0:09:13.440 that's just cracking Wise cracks or staying up with the 0:09:14.559 --> 0:09:16.560 you know, with the rollers in her. 0:09:16.440 --> 0:09:19.360 Hair, for driving the car while the two leads make 0:09:19.400 --> 0:09:24.080 out in the back of the car. You don't want 0:09:24.120 --> 0:09:27.040 to be that. No, what did you? What did you? 0:09:27.280 --> 0:09:29.160 I don't want them to make up in the bags? 0:09:29.559 --> 0:09:32.960 Right? Well, did you sprinkle on top of what might 0:09:33.000 --> 0:09:35.080 have been eve Arden for you, which it very easily 0:09:35.080 --> 0:09:36.920 could have been. What did you sprinkle on top of 0:09:36.960 --> 0:09:38.560 that to make sure that it wasn't eve Arden? What 0:09:38.559 --> 0:09:40.239 do you do that eve Arden didn't. 0:09:39.960 --> 0:09:46.720 Do I get dramatic or frightened or reel about something 0:09:47.320 --> 0:09:48.400 or pain. 0:09:49.240 --> 0:09:53.920 Yeah there's a pain, Yeah you do. Yes, it's not working. 0:09:54.120 --> 0:09:57.840 Dramatic happens to me in the course of a comedy. 0:09:59.440 --> 0:09:59.960 I don't know. 0:10:00.040 --> 0:10:02.160 Oh, but are you always that way. 0:10:03.040 --> 0:10:04.280 What was I always what way? 0:10:05.160 --> 0:10:08.320 Complicating things with the pain of your existence. There's this 0:10:08.360 --> 0:10:10.040 thing you tap into. Did you do when you were 0:10:10.120 --> 0:10:10.560 very young? 0:10:11.120 --> 0:10:12.520 I think so? I think I did. 0:10:13.040 --> 0:10:14.240 Were you the complicated one? 0:10:16.040 --> 0:10:16.199 Oh? 0:10:16.280 --> 0:10:21.120 I think so. I mean very often I would hear 0:10:21.240 --> 0:10:25.720 around our house where's the lane? And then was oh? 0:10:26.360 --> 0:10:28.640 And they'd say oh, and I'd say, I'm right here. 0:10:29.640 --> 0:10:30.680 They were worried about you. 0:10:30.760 --> 0:10:34.840 Yeah, everybody was worried about me, because when I wasn't accountable, 0:10:35.040 --> 0:10:38.280 I was. I scared him and I didn't mean to. 0:10:39.320 --> 0:10:41.520 When did performing begin for you as a were a 0:10:41.520 --> 0:10:42.840 performer as a child. 0:10:44.160 --> 0:10:47.079 I was laughing. I was born laughing. 0:10:47.240 --> 0:10:47.840 They were funny. 0:10:48.200 --> 0:10:52.800 Oh God, I was funny. I really was funny, and 0:10:52.960 --> 0:10:56.319 I made everybody laugh and I wasn't conscious of it. 0:10:56.880 --> 0:10:57.120 Right. 0:10:57.559 --> 0:11:00.000 I want to tell you something. I love to tell 0:11:00.360 --> 0:11:05.640 you a line from my life to see if you 0:11:05.800 --> 0:11:08.360 get this, and I'm going to tell it to you. 0:11:12.160 --> 0:11:15.800 My mother and dad, as a present to me when 0:11:15.960 --> 0:11:21.000 I was six years old, took me to Niagara Falls, 0:11:21.080 --> 0:11:25.640 which was very close to Birmingham, Michigan. And I kept 0:11:25.679 --> 0:11:28.160 hearing about this, and I was going to wear my 0:11:28.280 --> 0:11:31.960 new pink coat and hat and I was going to 0:11:32.200 --> 0:11:35.600 Niagara Falls, and I kept hearing it and you know, 0:11:35.720 --> 0:11:41.920 Christmas Morning, Christmas whatever it was. And and I never 0:11:41.960 --> 0:11:45.240 said a word. I just sat in the backseat and 0:11:45.280 --> 0:11:49.960 I just waited. They pulled up Alec to the parking 0:11:50.000 --> 0:11:55.280 lot in Niagara Falls, and here we are. We're here, lady, 0:11:55.400 --> 0:11:58.240 we're here, Come on, get out. And it was just me, 0:11:58.440 --> 0:12:01.840 mom and dad. So that two sisters, the older sisters, 0:12:02.320 --> 0:12:10.080 you know, the hell with them. And I got very 0:12:10.240 --> 0:12:15.360 teary eyed and pulled my mother back from the car 0:12:15.880 --> 0:12:20.760 and said, Mama, what We're going to go see Niagara Falls? 0:12:23.160 --> 0:12:26.760 And I asked her if Niagara Falls had a baby, 0:12:29.679 --> 0:12:32.680 And to me and to my mother and my father 0:12:33.000 --> 0:12:37.040 it was one of the most extraordinary dramatic lines of 0:12:37.160 --> 0:12:42.640 all time. All I was interested in is did this 0:12:42.760 --> 0:12:48.240 woman Niagara Falls have a baby? Because then I could 0:12:48.280 --> 0:12:51.520 play with her. And it was the I think, an 0:12:51.640 --> 0:12:57.280 absolute proof of how lonely and sad I was as 0:12:57.320 --> 0:13:00.720 a kid. I didn't know what the hell aretistic was 0:13:00.760 --> 0:13:04.320 all about. I really didn't. I knew I had to 0:13:04.360 --> 0:13:08.200 express myself. I knew I had to express myself, and 0:13:08.240 --> 0:13:09.439 that's all there was to it. 0:13:09.760 --> 0:13:12.640 So when you left Michigan. When you left home, you 0:13:12.679 --> 0:13:14.760 lived at home in Michigan. Your family lived in Michigan 0:13:14.840 --> 0:13:16.880 until you left home. Did you go to college? 0:13:17.280 --> 0:13:19.600 No, I didn't go to college, which I graduated from 0:13:19.679 --> 0:13:22.439 high school. I went where Sacred Heart Convent. 0:13:23.000 --> 0:13:23.880 You went to a convent. 0:13:23.960 --> 0:13:28.319 I went to a convent. The soccer cur highly educational, 0:13:28.960 --> 0:13:31.200 big scholastic, Scooby doo. 0:13:31.480 --> 0:13:34.040 You went there for what twelve years? That was your 0:13:34.120 --> 0:13:36.080 high school? When you left there? 0:13:36.200 --> 0:13:41.000 Where'd you go to Dushen Residence? Which was also the 0:13:41.120 --> 0:13:46.160 soccer cur but it was a residence finishing school for 0:13:46.200 --> 0:13:51.400 what it was like after school stuff, you know, Like 0:13:52.120 --> 0:13:54.120 I'm trying to think of one of the courses that 0:13:54.200 --> 0:13:58.440 we took, current events, isn't that? I guess how long. 0:13:58.360 --> 0:13:58.920 Were you there? 0:14:00.200 --> 0:14:00.560 Years? 0:14:00.760 --> 0:14:01.680 Two years after that? 0:14:01.960 --> 0:14:04.320 And I went out and majored in dramatics at the 0:14:04.400 --> 0:14:06.840 New School in Greenwich Village. 0:14:07.440 --> 0:14:10.160 The finishing school was in the city where you were 0:14:10.200 --> 0:14:11.320 back in Michigan. 0:14:10.880 --> 0:14:12.839 In Greenwich Village, the finishing school. 0:14:12.880 --> 0:14:15.120 I'm in New York And you went to finishing school 0:14:15.120 --> 0:14:15.560 in New York. 0:14:16.080 --> 0:14:19.880 Absolutely, see on ninety first and fifth Avenue. 0:14:19.960 --> 0:14:20.640 Oh my god. 0:14:20.920 --> 0:14:25.680 Yeah, And I took these three courses at the school, 0:14:25.760 --> 0:14:28.840 which was fine. I had a roommate from Chicago who 0:14:28.920 --> 0:14:33.760 was majoring in journalism, and we were all very sophisticated abroads. 0:14:34.400 --> 0:14:36.200 You went to New School for drama. That was your 0:14:36.200 --> 0:14:39.840 first acting exposure able boom. What did you think about 0:14:39.880 --> 0:14:41.760 it when you first I loved it. 0:14:43.080 --> 0:14:46.120 I sat next to Myrlon Brando. That was didn't hurt 0:14:46.200 --> 0:14:46.560 at all. 0:14:47.000 --> 0:14:48.080 That'll get you through class. 0:14:48.280 --> 0:14:51.040 Yeah, Walter Matho was on the other side of me 0:14:52.160 --> 0:14:56.600 at the New School. Yeah, we had a very stellar cast. 0:14:57.720 --> 0:15:00.280 I was getting along fine and having the most fun 0:15:00.280 --> 0:15:01.480 I've ever had in my own life. 0:15:01.520 --> 0:15:03.840 What's the first job you ever got? 0:15:04.840 --> 0:15:06.960 Well, first of all, I was at the studio theater 0:15:07.080 --> 0:15:09.880 at the New School and we had our own theater 0:15:10.320 --> 0:15:15.960 and Piscott he directed, and Stella Adler directed, and we 0:15:16.040 --> 0:15:22.000 had all those Stanislawski people. We had more fun, Alex. 0:15:22.120 --> 0:15:23.760 You couldn't believe. 0:15:23.440 --> 0:15:27.520 It was Stella like as a director, heaven she was 0:15:27.560 --> 0:15:33.880 what made her so. She's very insightful, all. 0:15:33.760 --> 0:15:40.760 This kind of dramatics, you know, Slaine and Marlin and 0:15:40.960 --> 0:15:47.040 Wolf and you do it. She scream her head off 0:15:47.160 --> 0:15:54.040 at us. She was crazy woman, absolutely divine. 0:15:53.080 --> 0:15:55.800 And when you left that program. What was your first job. 0:15:55.680 --> 0:15:59.960 Job summers Dock where Westport, Connecticut? 0:16:00.120 --> 0:16:01.040 Do you remember what you did? 0:16:01.320 --> 0:16:05.760 Yeah, Craig's Wife. I think I did. 0:16:07.400 --> 0:16:09.880 People they say years ago, they go, what show did 0:16:09.920 --> 0:16:11.760 you do? And you name a show people just never 0:16:11.800 --> 0:16:13.840 heard of. They go, Craig is Craig's wife. 0:16:14.120 --> 0:16:15.760 Who did you play Craig's wife? 0:16:15.920 --> 0:16:17.560 They nurse? What did you play? 0:16:17.720 --> 0:16:21.840 I played the ant, the ant that visited and told 0:16:21.920 --> 0:16:24.040 craig wife she was full of shit. 0:16:24.200 --> 0:16:26.120 You started as an aunt, and you're going to finish 0:16:26.160 --> 0:16:28.480 as an ant. You're going now you're an aunt. That's 0:16:28.520 --> 0:16:30.720 your next that's your that's your role. Now you're an aunt. 0:16:30.880 --> 0:16:34.400 They're not allowed to call me because it's so boring. 0:16:34.520 --> 0:16:37.840 They called me Todd Lane because my mother is French. 0:16:38.200 --> 0:16:40.240 To Lane. I thought they were going to call it 0:16:41.200 --> 0:16:44.480 lady stretch. How would have them call you? No, her highness? 0:16:45.440 --> 0:16:50.240 But I just had the most wonderful time in dramatic school. 0:16:50.360 --> 0:16:52.800 And then what about your first job, Douglas? 0:16:52.840 --> 0:16:55.360 I did my first play with Kirk Douglas. 0:16:55.360 --> 0:16:57.600 What show with Kirk Craig's. 0:16:58.280 --> 0:17:00.480 Wait a minute, Wait a minute, I'll tell you in 0:17:00.560 --> 0:17:01.080 a minute. 0:17:02.120 --> 0:17:04.879 Close you and Kirk Douglas. You're on a stage in 0:17:04.920 --> 0:17:05.359 New York. 0:17:05.640 --> 0:17:11.359 Yeah, I play. And also where is my black bag? Alec? 0:17:11.640 --> 0:17:11.960 Hunter? 0:17:12.240 --> 0:17:15.119 I need I need orange juice? 0:17:15.560 --> 0:17:17.439 Hunter? Come in places? Can we send Hunter in here? 0:17:17.480 --> 0:17:22.680 Plays with the provisions? Hunter. Ryan Herdlica, who accompanied Elaine 0:17:22.720 --> 0:17:25.840 to the studio, came through the door juice in hand. 0:17:26.240 --> 0:17:30.400 I need some orange juice. Diab Beanies is kicking up. 0:17:31.800 --> 0:17:34.560 I need Hunter, my good man. Hunters here now. 0:17:34.520 --> 0:17:39.000 Yeah, Hunter's here. All's right with the world. Okay, we're 0:17:39.080 --> 0:17:40.040 how about a glass? 0:17:40.520 --> 0:17:44.639 Yes, that's a cleaning. We'll get them a clean. We'll 0:17:44.680 --> 0:17:45.240 go get a clean. 0:17:45.240 --> 0:17:47.439 It's all right, it's all right if you just empty 0:17:47.520 --> 0:17:51.800 that glass, it's heaven. I need some orange juice. You 0:17:51.880 --> 0:17:53.640 know that I'm diabetic. 0:17:53.200 --> 0:17:55.439 Yes, of course I need. The world knows by now. 0:17:55.359 --> 0:18:01.199 The world knows. Okay. You know what I couted the 0:18:01.240 --> 0:18:04.879 other day line of my father's that really is so 0:18:05.160 --> 0:18:08.360 naughty and just so much fun. Here's looking up your 0:18:08.359 --> 0:18:13.240 old address. Isn't that a great line? And he said 0:18:13.280 --> 0:18:15.280 it with no he used that was it? 0:18:15.359 --> 0:18:15.960 Nothing on it? 0:18:16.400 --> 0:18:18.400 That's right, all right, I'm going to drink this. 0:18:18.520 --> 0:18:20.000 I mean the oranges now, so we don't have some 0:18:20.080 --> 0:18:24.840 event here. That's cool, okay, all right, So now that 0:18:24.840 --> 0:18:27.640 you've had your orange juice and your brain freezes over, 0:18:28.680 --> 0:18:30.640 Kirk Douglas, what was the show? Do you remember? Now? 0:18:31.160 --> 0:18:32.399 Woman bites Dog? 0:18:35.200 --> 0:18:38.159 That orange juice. It's a miracle elixir. I want to 0:18:38.160 --> 0:18:41.040 mean a case of that orange juice. It's kind of dog, 0:18:41.520 --> 0:18:43.760 Woman bites Dog. What'd you play in that? 0:18:43.840 --> 0:18:48.479 If you girlfriend? He lived with I didn't even know 0:18:48.560 --> 0:18:51.280 what that phrase meant. 0:18:51.440 --> 0:18:52.240 You were a floozy. 0:18:52.840 --> 0:18:55.520 Well no, I wasn't. I just but I lived with 0:18:55.640 --> 0:18:58.639 him and I wasn't married to him. I didn't know 0:18:58.640 --> 0:18:59.399 what that meant. 0:18:59.520 --> 0:19:02.280 What do you mean, Kirk Douglas, Oh. 0:19:01.880 --> 0:19:05.640 My god, I loved him, Oh god, I loved him. 0:19:05.640 --> 0:19:06.639 And what an actor. 0:19:07.960 --> 0:19:10.400 And he's one of the few men who was as 0:19:10.440 --> 0:19:13.760 great an actor as he was a star. Oh he 0:19:13.880 --> 0:19:14.760 was a great actor. 0:19:14.840 --> 0:19:15.840 He was a great actor. 0:19:16.000 --> 0:19:16.879 He was a great actor. 0:19:16.920 --> 0:19:20.800 I loved him, and he loved me. He flipped over me. 0:19:21.280 --> 0:19:25.080 I've known him for years and he took me half 0:19:25.119 --> 0:19:27.960 way away for the weekend, and then I discovered that 0:19:28.040 --> 0:19:32.399 I shouldn't go. He took you half way away to 0:19:32.520 --> 0:19:34.960 Poem Springs, and then I said I shouldn't be going. 0:19:35.040 --> 0:19:35.879 So what did you do? You hit? 0:19:35.960 --> 0:19:36.880 Like what he said? 0:19:38.080 --> 0:19:39.440 Where were your redlands? 0:19:39.720 --> 0:19:44.800 I don't know. We were halfway to Palm Beach Springs. 0:19:44.680 --> 0:19:47.040 So you're driving east and we. 0:19:46.880 --> 0:19:49.000 Were driving for the weekend. 0:19:48.680 --> 0:19:51.160 And you decided you didn't want to Well, I. 0:19:51.119 --> 0:19:54.399 Said, I'm getting nervous because what do you want me 0:19:54.440 --> 0:19:58.520 to do when we get up here? Douglas, Oh, Elaine, 0:19:58.920 --> 0:20:00.840 he knew I was a verge and so he was 0:20:00.960 --> 0:20:01.720 dealing with that. 0:20:05.440 --> 0:20:08.560 We'll have more with a lame stretch after the break. 0:20:21.119 --> 0:20:23.320 So what was the first leading role you had on Broadway? 0:20:23.880 --> 0:20:27.880 Big row, take more rs you see? Can remember. 0:20:32.119 --> 0:20:37.600 Of the big part? Oh, big big part I had 0:20:37.840 --> 0:20:41.440 was Angel in the Wings, which was a review. Hardest 0:20:41.440 --> 0:20:44.960 thing in the world to do a review, and the 0:20:45.119 --> 0:20:45.440 kind of. 0:20:45.359 --> 0:20:49.000 Review like New Faces was like Leonard Simons sketches one 0:20:49.040 --> 0:20:53.760 sket and I was the big busted you know, girl 0:20:53.960 --> 0:20:55.840 in the in the bedroom. 0:20:56.280 --> 0:20:59.960 I was the I was the. 0:20:58.840 --> 0:20:59.920 The piece on the side. 0:21:00.320 --> 0:21:02.280 Yeah, so you hear you? 0:21:02.359 --> 0:21:05.159 Is it amazing you with this virginal You went to 0:21:05.280 --> 0:21:08.720 Sucker cur and you went to finishing school and as 0:21:08.760 --> 0:21:11.800 soon as you're out, God is just tempting you. He's 0:21:11.840 --> 0:21:14.760 taking Marlon Branda on one side of you, and Kirk 0:21:14.800 --> 0:21:17.040 Douglas is reving up the convertible to take you to 0:21:17.080 --> 0:21:20.119 Palm Springs, and you're the fluzy here and you're the 0:21:20.119 --> 0:21:22.400 peace on the side, the busty fem the tale. 0:21:22.880 --> 0:21:28.440 But what I was really doing is learning my lines 0:21:29.040 --> 0:21:34.040 to the play or to the television or to the 0:21:34.440 --> 0:21:40.399