Speaker 1: Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to another fine edition of
Speaker 1: the podcast.
Speaker 2: That is Sweeping America, Mopping America. We're sweeping America, sucking up.
Speaker 1: Our little show is called Really No Really Podcast, where
Speaker 1: I Jason Alexander, and my friend and co host mister
Speaker 1: Peter Tilden. We explore things that make us go really no, Really,
Speaker 1: That's exactly.
Speaker 2: What we do. So you don't know.
Speaker 1: We're recently talking about projecting forward. What what do we
Speaker 1: think will be like when we're older, and frankly, we
Speaker 1: can't get much older than we do. About everything we
Speaker 1: are complaining, I already have aches and pains that I'm
Speaker 1: not enjoying. The hair keeps going. I didn't think I
Speaker 1: could lose more hair, but it's going. More is growing,
Speaker 1: clipping inside the nose. I have a bad add about everything,
Speaker 1: and everybody we know that's going through this has become
Speaker 1: the most miserable bunch of people on the planet. There's
Speaker 1: a reason young people don't want to be near us.
Speaker 1: We're not pleasant. Yes, by the way, my wife want
Speaker 1: to be near us so well, that has nothing to
Speaker 1: do with your age. By the way, we are, we
Speaker 1: have in our studio today a gentleman who is the
Speaker 1: antithesis of everything I was just talking about, absolutely the opposite.
Speaker 1: Now I'll save his name for the end is you
Speaker 1: absolutely know him, and you've known him all your life,
Speaker 1: as have I. A multiple award winner, Golden Globes, Tony's, Grammy's,
Speaker 1: Daytime Emmy, Primetime Emmys. He's in the Television Hall of Fame.
Speaker 1: He's on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. He's got a
Speaker 1: Screen Actors Killed Lifetime Achievement Award. He should frankly have
Speaker 1: twenty of them. He's a Kennedy Center Honor recipient. I'll
Speaker 1: just name the big one, Mary Poppins, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang,
Speaker 1: the comic and his own.
Speaker 2: Titular, The hell are You Show?
Speaker 1: The Dick Van Dyke Show in our studio today, A
Speaker 1: legend and someone who I really am. Just I pinch
Speaker 1: myself and I'm amazed, and I go, I know this man.
Speaker 1: Say hello, Peter to uh mister Dick Van Dyke and
Speaker 1: his lovely wife.
Speaker 2: Such a pleasure.
Speaker 3: And to Jason's point, I don't think I've ever seen
Speaker 3: you not happy and not joyous.
Speaker 2: You always seem.
Speaker 1: We'll talk to Arlene about that.
Speaker 3: That's no, but that's that is who that's what you
Speaker 3: put out. That's the vibe that you put out. And
Speaker 3: much like my partner here, when people see him because
Speaker 3: of the role he played on Seinfeld, it doesn't matter
Speaker 3: where we are in the world, they break into a smile.
Speaker 1: It's an amazing way to go through the world. But
Speaker 1: you know, mine is because I played the biggest schmuck
Speaker 1: in the world there and they're so But for you,
Speaker 1: it's because there is real joy. You know, there was
Speaker 1: intended joy, and particularly in your career, you got to
Speaker 1: them when they were very young and they have carried
Speaker 1: that that connection with you all their life. So I
Speaker 1: have to imagine when when people see you and they
Speaker 1: light up, you know.
Speaker 4: It's wonderful.
Speaker 2: Is it a great way to go through?
Speaker 4: The greatest feeling in the world.
Speaker 1: And Dick, do you ever feel like you have to?
Speaker 2: Can you have a bad day out there? Can you?
Speaker 1: Can you ever not give them back what they're hoping for?
Speaker 2: No?
Speaker 4: I always do that, But at ninety seven, sometimes I
Speaker 4: don't have good days, you know.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, but still not in a tabloids. I've never
Speaker 3: seen a negative I don't Did you hang out with
Speaker 3: a Hollywood crowd?
Speaker 4: Because this is really Hollywood. Everybody I knew in the
Speaker 4: business is dead.
Speaker 2: Okay, wow and clearly normally Yeah, who's one hundred? Right?
Speaker 4: And mel Brooks about a year younger than I. The
Speaker 4: three of them are the only shipbors.
Speaker 2: That's that's true.
Speaker 1: I mean, that's My mom passed away a few years ago,
Speaker 1: but she was ninety eight she passed. And one of
Speaker 1: the things I want to talk to you about today is,
Speaker 1: you know, you exude this joyfulness. You really do in
Speaker 1: your career reflects so much of that. But you've gone
Speaker 1: through some really hard stuff. Oh yeah, really hard stuff.
Speaker 1: And that's why I really wanted to talk to you today,
Speaker 1: because you know, we're all going through hard stuff. People
Speaker 1: go through hard stuff. But you managed to get to
Speaker 1: this joyful place even at a challenging age like ninety seven,
Speaker 1: where your world, the people that you've lived your life
Speaker 1: with are starting to leave us or have left us.
Speaker 1: The world gets smaller and smaller. We talked about that
Speaker 1: a little bit, and yes, if I'm at sixty three,
Speaker 1: I've got little aches and pains and things where I go,
Speaker 1: this is not going well. I mean, so how do
Speaker 1: you what to the extent, what is the secret of
Speaker 1: your if there if.
Speaker 4: They're having a beautiful young wife that helps, who is
Speaker 4: a doll and a great sense to him? And we sing.
Speaker 4: We're a duet. We sing together, and it's it's just
Speaker 4: it's great. I'm having a second uh youth. Really, I'm
Speaker 4: having such a ball. I work out three days a week.
Speaker 4: I go to the gym, and I wrote a book
Speaker 4: called Keep Moving, you know, about exercising. And when I
Speaker 4: see I always feel old until I see somebody else
Speaker 4: my age, and then I feel pretty good.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, and you're not. You know, Jason said, I
Speaker 3: had lunch with Dick. I said, did he do a jig?
Speaker 3: Did he dance? He said, how did you know? I said,
Speaker 3: because he always anytime I've been around him, he does
Speaker 3: a jig. And you're that You're that mobile still too,
Speaker 3: which is amazing. And I don't know how much that hurts.
Speaker 3: I just said, when you sat down, I said, when
Speaker 3: you get older, it used to be when you got
Speaker 3: up is when you made noise.
Speaker 2: Now it's when you sit down.
Speaker 3: And yeah, back to the Hollywood thing, and you're joy.
Speaker 3: How did you navigate that world? He got a three
Speaker 3: picture deal with United Artists. You had a show named
Speaker 3: after you. Your first sitcom has your name.
Speaker 1: And not only named after you, but I only recently
Speaker 1: found out that Carl wrote it for himself.
Speaker 2: Carl went after he did the pilot.
Speaker 4: That, well, no, you never saw the pilot.
Speaker 2: I never saw the pilot.
Speaker 4: It's not very good. It isn't very good. Carl was
Speaker 4: not a good actor. He could do comedy, but somehow
Speaker 4: he was never believable.
Speaker 2: He was wrong.
Speaker 3: Pretty amazing, but dick. So in a tough business, you
Speaker 3: got a sitcom that Carl Reiner was supposed to start
Speaker 3: in and they put your name. How did that happen
Speaker 3: that your name ended up?
Speaker 4: They couldn't think about the title. We sat, we worked,
Speaker 4: and we could not think of the title. So that
Speaker 4: and then the first year, nobody ever heard of me,
Speaker 4: and we were on against Perry Como and they canceled this,
Speaker 4: and Sheldon Leonard, who was the producer, Yeah, went to
Speaker 4: Cincinnati and talked to the P and G guys and
Speaker 4: talked them in letting us, are you pison disappeared?
Speaker 2: Amazing?
Speaker 1: No, wait, So in the first year of the show,
Speaker 1: it wasn't It wasn't responding with audience.
Speaker 4: So we were on against Perry Como and he got
Speaker 4: all these.
Speaker 2: And he was just he was taking the audience.
Speaker 4: Oh, I got Dick, kept saying, Who's Who's Dick Van Dyke?
Speaker 2: Right?
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah? What is it? Amazing?
Speaker 2: How that what that did for your career.
Speaker 3: It's such history and what you guys accomplished. It was
Speaker 3: such an iconic show. And I understand he wrote six
Speaker 3: episodes so everybody would know what what the roles were.
Speaker 4: Right for the first he wrote all thirty nine s
Speaker 4: the thirty.
Speaker 2: Nine episodes of season. That alone is back then. Wow wow.
Speaker 4: And then we got some really good guys, Sam dan
Speaker 4: Off and Bill Perski, great writers. Yeah, such fun and
Speaker 4: I always got to help, you know, I could come
Speaker 4: up with a line thirty.
Speaker 2: I'm just trying to think thirty nine episode. Not only
Speaker 2: was it thirty nine episodes.
Speaker 1: Now, sure, half the show was a family show, you know,
Speaker 1: the family with you and Mary telling more, but the
Speaker 1: other half was really inside baseball. What's it like inside
Speaker 1: a TV comedy running room. Nobody would do that today,
Speaker 1: they would go.
Speaker 2: To inside Nobody's gonna care about it?
Speaker 3: And by the way, for that time period, Rose Marie
Speaker 3: was the first portrayal of a single female that didn't
Speaker 3: need a guy that wasn't making dinner for somebody. It
Speaker 3: was so ahead of its time, though, another piece of trivia.
Speaker 3: Because I heard you sing it no more, Amsterdam wrote
Speaker 3: lyrics to us.
Speaker 4: That's right, he wrote, He wrote the lyrics for it.
Speaker 2: Do you remember them?
Speaker 4: Oh? Sure?
Speaker 2: Can you do them a little?
Speaker 4: You think that you got trouble, well, troubles uh bubble,
Speaker 4: So tell will mister trouble to get lost? Why not
Speaker 4: hold your head up by and stop crying, start sighing,
Speaker 4: and don't forget to keep your fingers crossed when you
Speaker 4: know the joy of living is loving and giving. You'll
Speaker 4: be there when the win they dies are tossed a
Speaker 4: smile as Jester Frown's turned up, So I down, so smiler,
Speaker 4: brown or defrost and don't forget to keep your favous
Speaker 4: cross But.
Speaker 2: That's not wrong? Is that great?
Speaker 3: By the way, for a second, Mary Amsterdam's the state
Speaker 3: just got twenty away from something went wait a minute,
Speaker 3: I didn't want somebody. And much like Seinfeld, there's so
Speaker 3: many parallelization. As far as Tony winners and as far
Speaker 3: as Joey Carl decided after five years to pull up,
Speaker 3: they never wanted to go past five, like Jerry didn't
Speaker 3: want to go piss on that could the show could
Speaker 3: have gone on, correct, Yeah, Carl.
Speaker 4: Was the only one that didn't want to go on.
Speaker 4: He wanted to move on into movies and everything and
Speaker 4: the rest of us.
Speaker 2: What was what were you?
Speaker 1: What were you thinking when when you're on a joyous
Speaker 1: hit show and the boss wants to pull the plug?
Speaker 2: What were you?
Speaker 1: I mean, did you go that's it, I'm done, I'm
Speaker 1: I'm finished.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I didn't know what we were going to do.
Speaker 4: Everybody and Mary Taylor Moore, you.
Speaker 5: Had the movie, you had Mary Poppins in between those
Speaker 5: did Poppins?
Speaker 1: Yeah, that would be big. Was that during the run
Speaker 1: of the show.
Speaker 4: Yeah, uh huh, yeah it was yeah, right, that's right.
Speaker 4: During the time off we shot it only took four months.
Speaker 4: Chitty Bang Bank took over a year. Really, we couldn't
Speaker 4: find any sun in England. Wow, sure, always waiting for
Speaker 4: the Yeah we got a shot. Wow. A great thing
Speaker 4: with me was I always wanted to be an entertainer,
Speaker 4: but you know what happened to me. I wanted to
Speaker 4: be a working actor. What happened to me is still
Speaker 4: I'm shocked that I had such wonderful things happened to.
Speaker 2: Me, iconic things.
Speaker 1: And when you were beginning as an entertainer, because I
Speaker 1: know you did. You did a pantomime act with a partner, right,
Speaker 1: a partner and you were a radio host, right, or
Speaker 1: a television host of something.
Speaker 4: I was a radio announcer at seventeen. During the war,
Speaker 4: everybody got drafted, right, and I got to be a
Speaker 4: radio announcer at seventeen. I thought that was the future,
Speaker 4: you know.
Speaker 3: And did you do CBS mornings too? Were you on
Speaker 3: the CBS Morning show for looks? That's unbelievable for a year,
Speaker 3: I did it and there was no network to the coast.
Speaker 3: It was an hour and a half show. We'd do
Speaker 3: it once and then do it again.
Speaker 4: I had to do it twice, so it was the
Speaker 4: second time, second time better. Walter Cronkite was my newsman.
Speaker 2: That hack, that hack. What happened to him.
Speaker 4: Back when they you know, voyces mint something on and
Speaker 4: he would They transferred him to evening, of course, and
Speaker 4: he thought he was firing. And he came to me
Speaker 4: and said, Dick, what did I do? I should do?
Speaker 4: I can't fire anything, you know what?
Speaker 3: I love it, Dick said, Dick Van like to me saying,
Speaker 3: Schmuck's the world too.
Speaker 2: It's the world to me.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but that takes me back to so the reason
Speaker 1: I was saying, you know, you started in a panami
Speaker 1: mact and then you were doing you know, sort of
Speaker 1: announce work. When did musical comedy, singing and dancing? And
Speaker 1: I think you told me a story that when you
Speaker 1: got by by Berdie on Broadway, you hadn't really danced.
Speaker 2: No, So how did all that?
Speaker 1: Who said I can get this guy to dance because
Speaker 1: you're an iconic dancer, Gower Champion.
Speaker 4: I was looking for work. I was auditioning for everything
Speaker 4: except maybe opera and Shakespeare. I tried out for Tom
Speaker 4: Poston beat me out of a couple of they. I
Speaker 4: went in and sang a little song, Yeah, Ray Bolger
Speaker 4: once a little bit of a soft shoe. And I
Speaker 4: think Galerg saw himself on the park. We were exactly
Speaker 4: the same size and shape. Yeah, And it came up
Speaker 4: on the stage. He said you've got the part and
Speaker 4: I said, mister Champian, I can't dance. I don't dance.
Speaker 4: He said, I'll teach him, and he did. It was
Speaker 4: like learning to fly.
Speaker 2: It was amazing, great. Yeah, I mean I worked with
Speaker 2: Cheetah on Broadway.
Speaker 4: Is she something?
Speaker 2: What were you in with it?
Speaker 1: I was in the show with her and Liza Minelli
Speaker 1: called the Rink. They played a mother and daughter.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and she a fireball or what? Oh?
Speaker 2: She is? She is my idol. She's my idol.
Speaker 4: She carried me in that show.
Speaker 1: Well you will you tell the story of put on
Speaker 1: a Happy Face?
Speaker 2: Do you remember what you told me?
Speaker 4: Well? Yeah, but I just read her book. I'm reading
Speaker 4: it down because, uh, we were in Philadelphia during tryouts
Speaker 4: and they came in with put her on a Happy
Speaker 4: Face for Cheetah, And my impression was she said, Dick's
Speaker 4: got nothing to do in the first act, why don't
Speaker 4: you let him have it? So I've always credited her,
Speaker 4: but in the book she says they took the song
Speaker 4: and gave it to Dick, and she just was I miffed, no,
Speaker 4: because I had a lot of other things to do,
Speaker 4: which is not Yeah, I thought Cheta gave it to me.
Speaker 1: Well you know what, that's because the Cheetah we know
Speaker 1: would have given it to you, I think. But what's
Speaker 1: what's so fascinating to me is not only did you
Speaker 1: learn to dance, but but it's almost as if you
Speaker 1: have your own unique style and your choreographers have figured
Speaker 1: out how to put a world of dance on you.
Speaker 4: I think if I'd had training, it wouldn't have been
Speaker 4: as unique.
Speaker 2: You would have been like everybody else, had my own moves.
Speaker 2: And there's a joy to that too.
Speaker 3: And by the way, I know that you love Stan
Speaker 3: Laurel and and you can see some of that in
Speaker 3: everything that you do.
Speaker 2: And you did get to be friendly with him.
Speaker 4: At one point, yes, I did, and he noticed that.
Speaker 3: I really he got it. He really pointed out, that's mine,
Speaker 3: that's my Oh yeah, wow.
Speaker 2: Where was he when you met him? Was he in
Speaker 2: a picture home or was he returned?
Speaker 4: No, he was on at the Oceania apartments in Santa Monica.
Speaker 4: And then I got to meet Buster Keaton also spend.
Speaker 2: A day with him.
Speaker 1: Oh my god, tell how you found them, because you
Speaker 1: told me.
Speaker 4: I was looking through the Santa Monica fold book one
Speaker 4: day for a number, and there it was Stan Laurel
Speaker 4: in the fold I just called them up and.
Speaker 3: He invited me, and then what's And then I got
Speaker 3: to ask you briefly about the alcoholism because you talked
Speaker 3: about it before and people hear about it.
Speaker 2: You admitting the alcoholism that you went.
Speaker 3: Oh back at that point in time, that was pretty
Speaker 3: brave and pretty amazing to do, because that could have
Speaker 3: tanked you could have had the public who saw you
Speaker 3: one way completely changed their attitude about you. It's not
Speaker 3: like today where people are brave coming out about their
Speaker 3: addictions and victim is a thing.
Speaker 2: This was a major thing. How did you decide that
Speaker 2: you were going to go public with that?
Speaker 4: Well, I just thought I should. You know, I've knew
Speaker 4: so many people who couldn't get out of it. I
Speaker 4: was in my thirties and I didn't drink. I moved
Speaker 4: to a neighborhood out in the island where they had
Speaker 4: parties every Saturday, and I started to drink with them
Speaker 4: before I knew it. I was hung up on this stuff.
Speaker 4: I couldn't believe it. Say it was smoking, But did
Speaker 4: you use it?
Speaker 3: Did you use the alcohol because you had nerves for
Speaker 3: performing that it help?
Speaker 2: No?
Speaker 4: No, I never drank at work or before work.
Speaker 2: Socially, it was performing.
Speaker 1: Social yeah, So it was all social stuff. So do
Speaker 1: you feel like it It did not ever have an
Speaker 1: impact on your work.
Speaker 4: No, I don't think it did. I remember a couple
Speaker 4: of times a music man, I was all I did
Speaker 4: it for a year, Yeah, on the road, and a
Speaker 4: couple of times you go out at night and I'd
Speaker 4: have a hangover the next day, right, and doing trouble.
Speaker 2: Yeah that is that is trouble.
Speaker 1: So that's even more interesting to me because because it
Speaker 1: wasn't impacting your work, you had to assess, I don't
Speaker 1: want this in my life. Yes, it wasn't that you
Speaker 1: weren't going to make a paycheck. It was that you
Speaker 1: just got to a point where said, oh, this is
Speaker 1: not what I want to be doing.
Speaker 2: You go uh.
Speaker 4: An alcoholic will go from a happy drunk eventually into
Speaker 4: a mean drunk and an unhappy guy. And I was
Speaker 4: getting test and I just hated it. Right, trying to
Speaker 4: quit smoking that was twice as hard as.
Speaker 2: You got cooked.
Speaker 4: I've never seen much worse than alcohol.
Speaker 2: How long did it take?
Speaker 4: Forever? I'm still chewing still gum? The next team gum
Speaker 4: in is fifty years, I think. But I went to
Speaker 4: a place called Shiic. Well, you they put you in
Speaker 4: like a phone booth with a big tub of sand
Speaker 4: and you have to sit in there and smoked an
Speaker 4: entire pack of cigarettes as fast as you can, and
Speaker 4: you begin to get dizzy and everything. I finally fear
Speaker 4: said they let me out, and I said, boy, that
Speaker 4: was and I lit a cigarette and they gave me
Speaker 4: my money back.
Speaker 2: Wow, wait a minute. The sand that was their whole act.
Speaker 2: That was the whole deal.
Speaker 1: That was That was how they were going to break you.
Speaker 1: And it didn't work.
Speaker 2: So did you do? So? You did it? For people
Speaker 2: that don't know.
Speaker 1: You did a movie called Cold Turkey, which is about
Speaker 1: a town that's trying to go Cold Turkey and cigarettes
Speaker 1: gonna they're gonna.
Speaker 2: Be paid to do it.
Speaker 1: Was that while you were a smoker after before it
Speaker 1: was uh.
Speaker 4: I had come to Norman with an idea for one
Speaker 4: guy and you couldn't whip it, so he made it
Speaker 4: the whole town. We were both trying to quit and
Speaker 4: he had a room full of local people. It was
Speaker 4: supposed to be smoke filled, and every he was smoking
Speaker 4: one note, lady was not holding it right, and Norman said, no,
Speaker 4: you have to. And I saw this. He smoked a
Speaker 4: pack of cigarettes. But we finally both quit. During that
Speaker 4: During that period it was fun. If you look back
Speaker 4: to the fifties and sixties.
Speaker 3: By the way, they had ads with doctors smoking cigarettes
Speaker 3: and saying how good it was.
Speaker 2: That was also a different times. How to promote that
Speaker 2: stuff commercials for that.
Speaker 4: Very and I did a commercial firm. My god, we
Speaker 4: regret that.
Speaker 6: Who knew?
Speaker 5: Nobody knew.
Speaker 1: I read that early on you considered potentially going into
Speaker 1: the ministry.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I was very much involved. I out in Long Island.
Speaker 4: I taught Sunday school and moved out here and became
Speaker 4: an elder in the Venbeterian Church there on Sandbay City,
Speaker 4: and I got so involved. They have a layman Sunday
Speaker 4: where a member of the congregation gets up and does
Speaker 4: a sermon, which I did all of a sudden, I mean,
Speaker 4: invited to Pasadena and churches everywhere, and I said, what
Speaker 4: am I doing? I don't know what I'm talking about?
Speaker 4: So I gave it. I kind of walked away from
Speaker 4: organized religion. I got to do it too much into it.
Speaker 1: Do you still have what you would think of as
Speaker 1: a profound faith or a profound.
Speaker 4: Specual I think so, yeah, just instinctively, as a kid,
Speaker 4: I never believed to know a story or any of that. Yeah, No,
Speaker 4: there's something in me that says it's true. You know,
Speaker 4: I don't know whether you live after death or anything
Speaker 4: of the kind. There's some kind of central intelligence. I
Speaker 4: just it's a sense. I don't know what.
Speaker 1: And was was that connection to the spirituality? Was that
Speaker 1: helpful at all during the times when you were trying
Speaker 1: to quit drinking or quit smoking or getting through.
Speaker 4: The remember asking for help?
Speaker 1: Really that may have been an issue for you.
Speaker 2: Remember when he's talking about ejiction, he's got joy. But
Speaker 2: you know what else?
Speaker 3: Because I lived in Maliburne for a long time and nobody.
Speaker 3: They don't publicize stuff, and unless a start of something negative.
Speaker 3: He shows up at the labor center all the time
Speaker 3: and hands on money to people and doesn't say anying,
Speaker 3: doesn't publicize it. I think you did twenty and Almo,
Speaker 3: if you're still doing it twenty years or thirty years.
Speaker 2: Where Midnight mission and the homeless shoulders?
Speaker 4: I mean, I gave you a lot of fives with me.
Speaker 4: And if I see a homeless guy, I pass out five.
Speaker 5: Who doesn't start the guy that you gave the five to.
Speaker 4: Oh my god, you'll have to bleep this. I walked
Speaker 4: up to the little guy that and handed him a five.
Speaker 4: Probably said, God, Dick, I'm not homeless. I'm your neighbor. Said,
Speaker 4: well clean yourself up.
Speaker 2: Wow, you didn't What was he doing? What was he
Speaker 2: doing when he gave them the fire?
Speaker 4: He would just standing on the street.
Speaker 2: Oh my god, you looked. You know that.
Speaker 1: When I lived in New York, there was a homeless guy.
Speaker 1: It was a regular, but a homeless guy on the corner.
Speaker 1: And his whole stick was.
Speaker 2: Give me a dollar, I'll tell you a joke.
Speaker 1: So I gave him a dollar one time and he
Speaker 1: told me a joke and I went, well, that was
Speaker 1: a terrible joke, and he said, well that.
Speaker 2: Was a one dollar joke, now, is it true? Regularly?
Speaker 2: Peck got the role because you turned down the omen
Speaker 2: I did. Why did you do that?
Speaker 4: I did? At the time, the movie struck me as
Speaker 4: really downbeat, you know, yeah, yeah, it was well worse
Speaker 4: than that. When I finished Uh Jitty Bangay, Sean was
Speaker 4: leaving the Bond series and Kubby cade me. He said,
Speaker 4: would you like to be Bond? And I said, if
Speaker 4: you heard my my British accent, quick.
Speaker 2: That fast, I blew that would you like to be? Listen?
Speaker 1: Your your cocky accent has taken a lot.
Speaker 4: Of crap over and I never had one.
Speaker 2: Well here's the thing.
Speaker 1: Actually, I will tell you as someone who has studied dialects,
Speaker 1: it wasn't as bad as you make it out to be.
Speaker 1: It was what I would say was it sounded a
Speaker 1: little bit like someone who had learned how to do
Speaker 1: it and was still thinking about it, you know, as
Speaker 1: opposed to it was just natural too.
Speaker 4: I have an excuse.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 4: They sent me a guy to teach me named padd O'Malley,
Speaker 4: an actor who was Irish. He came to my house
Speaker 4: after dinner one night, spent two hours with me. That
Speaker 4: was it, And that's and then they were I had,
Speaker 4: Oh my god, what I couldn't understand. Everybody I worked
Speaker 4: with on that movie was British, and nobody said yeah.
Speaker 1: I was always saying, why wouldn't why wouldn't Julie lean
Speaker 1: over and go it's actually don't say the h.
Speaker 2: On that one, you know, or whatever?
Speaker 4: Nobody would help me.
Speaker 1: Well, you know what, they because they're British, you know,
Speaker 1: as well as anybody. The Brits don't like to like
Speaker 1: insert themselves in people's affairs.
Speaker 4: It is a lot nicer to me than the Americans
Speaker 4: are on Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.
Speaker 3: People may not know that Ian Fleming, who wrote James
Speaker 3: Bond wrote Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. And when you said
Speaker 3: Kubby Brockley produced it, that's the producer for the games
Speaker 3: shows that movie.
Speaker 2: Is wrote the script. I wrote the script.
Speaker 3: But that's that movie could have been made written by
Speaker 3: somebody on psychedelics, right that movie When you read that
Speaker 3: script and you.
Speaker 2: Go, what am I looking at?
Speaker 4: Why we argued about when we get you know, with
Speaker 4: Baron Bomburst and Castle and everything, Yeah, is this in
Speaker 4: our imaginations or is it really happening? And we never
Speaker 4: really cleared it up either way?
Speaker 2: And kids, I would watch it and you go, what
Speaker 2: am I? Wow?
Speaker 4: Am I fat?
Speaker 2: Amazing?
Speaker 3: You know what Jason has people come up to him
Speaker 3: the tattoos of his head is do they have what's
Speaker 3: the strange fans stuff?
Speaker 2: Fans? What's the strangest thing that fans have shown you?
Speaker 2: Or die?
Speaker 4: I had a lady with who had my face.
Speaker 1: Yeah, oh so you know we talked for You've worked
Speaker 1: with a lot of kids. But what really strikes me,
Speaker 1: because I keep trying to do it too, is you
Speaker 1: work with your kids. You you've put family to work.
Speaker 4: I had them all on the diagnosis, you bet.
Speaker 1: And and what's your feeling behind that is clearly you're
Speaker 1: you're all for it. But I think about it all
Speaker 1: the time about you know, I think my kids are
Speaker 1: really talented. I'm happy to do stuff with them. I
Speaker 1: never know what the industry thinks about that.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 1: I got pitched something the other day. I said I'd
Speaker 1: love to do it if I could do it with
Speaker 1: my kid.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 1: And I don't know if that was a cool thing
Speaker 1: to say. But did you ever have any pushback on that?
Speaker 2: No?
Speaker 4: None at all. It was on Diagnosis Murder. Yeah, you know,
Speaker 4: I signed on to do Diagnosis Murder. Everybody said, nobody's
Speaker 4: going to watch you do a straight show if you're
Speaker 4: not doing combed.
Speaker 2: It ran for ten years.
Speaker 4: They loved it, they didn't none of them wanted to
Speaker 4: be actors.
Speaker 2: Though, really, not even Barry.
Speaker 4: They enjoyed it, but Barry didn't really really. His heart
Speaker 4: was never in it.
Speaker 1: Oh that's interesting, So you sort of dragged them into
Speaker 1: the family business like it was an insurance.
Speaker 4: He had a good voice and a good presence, but
Speaker 4: he just never it wasn't in James. You know, I
Speaker 4: never had one kid who wanted to really be an actor.
Speaker 1: What about your parents? Were they supportive? Did they get
Speaker 1: to see your success?
Speaker 2: Oh? Wow?
Speaker 1: And were they supportive all the way or were they
Speaker 1: show really?
Speaker 4: Yeah, they didn't try to tell me what to make
Speaker 4: of myself. Shouldn't do it? I had my grandmother Van
Speaker 4: Dyke was still alive when Mary Poppins premiered in Danville, Illinois,
Speaker 4: and they dressed her up and took her.
Speaker 2: How great.
Speaker 4: You always knew you would make it.
Speaker 3: Dicky, Wait, you on your sketch show that you did
Speaker 3: Andy Kaufman, that was his first appearance.
Speaker 2: Do you remember working with Andy Kaufman? Was that bizarre?
Speaker 4: Oh? Yeah? He was a strange one. We were out
Speaker 4: in the hall, was talking to the writers about something.
Speaker 4: Everybody was yelling and on the floor was Andy was
Speaker 4: sitting there across the leg meditating. He was a piece
Speaker 4: of work.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Did he rehearse because I heard he wouldn't rehearse
Speaker 2: on taxi?
Speaker 4: No, he wouldn't do much of it. Really, we just
Speaker 4: let him go. He gave him a spot and just
Speaker 4: let him do it. Yeah, well, we The plan was
Speaker 4: he had always interrupt us in the middle of the number,
Speaker 4: you know, and make us and we'd say and walk off.
Speaker 2: Wow, there you go. Is that one of the ones?
Speaker 1: That's one of the ones on the shelf I got.
Speaker 2: Time you say the word em I have an Emmy.
Speaker 2: You don't know what it's for. Yeah, that's right, I do.
Speaker 1: I will tell you the story when we're not here,
Speaker 1: because I don't want to eat time with it. But
Speaker 1: I have the weirdest Emmy in the world, in the
Speaker 1: world you should, you really want to enough?
Speaker 2: So you know.
Speaker 1: I was nominated for Seinfeld six or seven times. I've
Speaker 1: been nominated for other things.
Speaker 2: I've never won it.
Speaker 1: I did for the website Funny or Die. They were
Speaker 1: doing a series of music videos about racist memes in
Speaker 1: pop culture. They did one about African American pop culture,
Speaker 1: they did one about Asian and they did one about Jewish.
Speaker 1: They asked me if I would sing the Jewish one.
Speaker 2: I said sure.
Speaker 1: Now they go apparently there's an Emmy category for music
Speaker 1: comedy kind of right, Well, there's never enough to fill it.
Speaker 5: So were the only were you the only nominee.
Speaker 1: They wanted to know. They wanted to get you know
Speaker 1: that into the nominees. Now, I guess because nobody, none
Speaker 1: of the writers were really well known.
Speaker 2: They added me to the writing list.
Speaker 1: So I have an Emmy for writing, which I did
Speaker 1: not do on something that never appeared on TV. So
Speaker 1: it is the most it's the most book Emmy in
Speaker 1: the world. But I'm taking it.
Speaker 2: I'm taking it.
Speaker 1: I want to go back to more family with you,
Speaker 1: your brother, Jerry. You were close both of you. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I don't mean to be disrespectful. Arguably your career is
Speaker 1: a brighter star than his. Was that ever an issue?
Speaker 4: No, No, Jerry kind of knew what was going to happen,
Speaker 4: really said. They asked me as a kid if I
Speaker 4: wanted to be Dick, and I wasn't listening. He was
Speaker 4: inherently funny, and I can be funny, but the man
Speaker 4: was just funny inside. He could make me laugh anytime.
Speaker 4: He was just funny. He never had the greatest material.
Speaker 4: He got his big break at the at the the Flamingo,
Speaker 4: which is number one, got a new tux and ever
Speaker 4: he was headlining, and he took an upper before I
Speaker 4: went on and did the whole act. His upper lip stuck.
Speaker 4: His did the whole act like that. I was on
Speaker 4: the floor.
Speaker 3: Nobody could off from a glass of water. Johnny Carson
Speaker 3: almost got the part on the Dick vanduction.
Speaker 4: It was between the two of us.
Speaker 2: Yeah, not possible. He's not an actor at all.
Speaker 4: Well he doesn't sing or dance either.
Speaker 2: But OK, you were saved by porpoises.
Speaker 4: Oh yes, I was. Nobody believes that story now, although
Speaker 4: East Coast I think dolphins and porpoises are this.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's hard to tell them what's money. No, not
Speaker 2: if your a porpoise, you're going to excuse me. Yeah,
Speaker 2: So what happened?
Speaker 4: So it was I was working Virginia Beach. My Pardner
Speaker 4: and I ran a club and those were the days
Speaker 4: of the ten foot boards surfboards.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 4: I was trying to room to serf and not doing
Speaker 4: very well. And I got up beyond the breakers and
Speaker 4: just and fell asleep, just fell asleep on it. I
Speaker 4: woke up and I was not in sight of land.
Speaker 4: I was at sea, so I would just follow, you know,
Speaker 4: what I thought was the current. And I started bumping
Speaker 4: in under the thing, and I started seeing these fins
Speaker 4: swimming around, and I thought it's over. Yeah, there were
Speaker 4: dolphins or porpoises and they would bump up against that
Speaker 4: thing and push me all the way to shore. Is
Speaker 4: that amazing?
Speaker 3: Speaking of that your birthday, you didn't know your real
Speaker 3: birthday for years?
Speaker 2: Correct, No, I didn't.
Speaker 4: I was conceived out of wedlock. Ah. There's a word
Speaker 4: that goes by that one. Yeah. There. Yeah. And my
Speaker 4: parents went to Missouri for a few months and came
Speaker 4: home and never told her anybody. But they never told
Speaker 4: me my real birthday. And one day I was my
Speaker 4: mom was doing this, I was drying. We were talking
Speaker 4: and I said, you know, I was drawing the war
Speaker 4: and I said, I'm coming up eighteen. I don't want
Speaker 4: to be drafted. I want She said, I have here
Speaker 4: forty you are.
Speaker 2: Get it.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's who to this day, I have two birthdays
Speaker 4: and I get messed up with the Do you know this?
Speaker 2: I don't know if you.
Speaker 3: Mary Poppins was such a profitable film for Disney. It
Speaker 3: was made for four point four million that at twenty
Speaker 3: eight to five words the prophet from Mary Poppins allowed
Speaker 3: Walt Disney to purchase land in Florida and builds disney
Speaker 3: World your movie.
Speaker 4: In order to get that movie done, he mortgaged his house,
Speaker 4: borrowed all the money he could borrow to do Poppins
Speaker 4: Man turned out for him. Who who played the uncle Albert?
Speaker 2: That wonderful.
Speaker 4: He was a sweet but he would sit and he
Speaker 4: had a little radio, a little but he never listened
Speaker 4: to it. And one day I just happened to be
Speaker 4: looking at him. He opened it up and there's a
Speaker 4: little a pint of.
Speaker 1: That's where we were hiding the stash. And also this
Speaker 1: is a good moment to point out that lovely fight
Speaker 1: him in front of you, to tell everybody know what
Speaker 1: this is.
Speaker 4: When you know, Julie rightfully won an Oscar for Mary Poppins.
Speaker 4: I was nominated at one point and didn't get there.
Speaker 4: But when she got hers, the crew, the movie crew
Speaker 4: of Mary Papmas made me this award. It's the only
Speaker 4: one that exists.
Speaker 1: And you know what, if we can, We're going to
Speaker 1: take a photo of that and put it up on
Speaker 1: our website because it's really detailed and beautiful.
Speaker 4: It's a it's a real work and I've never shown
Speaker 4: it before.
Speaker 2: This is a first. It's fantastic.
Speaker 3: Is it true that they were considering Carrie Grant carry
Speaker 3: Grant to play in Mary Poppins for that role.
Speaker 2: I never heard that.
Speaker 1: That would have been very different, memory pups.
Speaker 4: I also turned out a movie with Carrie Grant really
Speaker 4: like I did.
Speaker 1: Remember you're a lot of your If you don't the book,
Speaker 1: come telling a big career.
Speaker 4: I got a better one than that. My agent called
Speaker 4: me one name, you said, I had a call from
Speaker 4: Sophia Lorenz manager. She'd like to do a comedy with you.
Speaker 4: And I said, you know, like, when do we start?
Speaker 4: He said, well, I turned it down. I said, you
Speaker 4: what He said, well, you would have to take second billing.
Speaker 4: I said, I don't care if they mentioned my name,
Speaker 4: and you said the money was I said, I'll pay them,
Speaker 4: but he blew it. I never got to work with Sophia.
Speaker 2: And so you know what else is cool? Currently?
Speaker 3: So I'm watching WandaVision, No, WandaVision that show Yeah, okay,
Speaker 3: Dick was a consultant on wand Division on what on
Speaker 3: WandaVision to show that's about that's a retro.
Speaker 1: They did it in the style of the Dick Van
Speaker 1: Dyk Show.
Speaker 2: And yeah, yeah, yeah, so they sat with you to
Speaker 2: make sure they were getting it right.
Speaker 4: Yes, that's right. I forgot I forgot that.
Speaker 2: How about that?
Speaker 1: And you you kind of pick up like you after Poppins.
Speaker 1: I think it was after Poppins you got interested in
Speaker 1: this animation stuff and you still do that.
Speaker 2: I don't know how to work.
Speaker 1: On my VCR and I still have a VCR.
Speaker 3: You.
Speaker 4: Yeah, that's a great hobby. Oh my godness, that great hobby.
Speaker 2: So do you ever do you show the results or
Speaker 2: do you know?
Speaker 4: I've never I just do it for fun.
Speaker 1: Just murdered.
Speaker 5: He did you got a credit? You did like a
Speaker 5: motorcycle or something?
Speaker 4: Well, that's right, you know I did a motorcycle jump
Speaker 4: off a cliff and it was a diagnosis murder. Yes,
Speaker 4: and I did do that as a special effect. Got
Speaker 4: it in there.
Speaker 2: That's a special affection. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I do want to ask you because I've enjoyed and
Speaker 1: this is the second time I've been able to sit
Speaker 1: with both of you. This is a very special marriage.
Speaker 1: I mean, I'm sure you must get kidded about it
Speaker 1: a lot, but how does how what are the joys
Speaker 1: of this for both of you? I mean, you're clearly
Speaker 1: you are a great couple, and it just takes sitting
Speaker 1: with the two of you for a minute or two.
Speaker 1: But how does this work for you? You met under
Speaker 1: kind of business circumstances. I'm sure it didn't just start
Speaker 1: up like like.
Speaker 4: I have never I have a great respect for women,
Speaker 4: but I've also scared the death of them. I've never
Speaker 4: hit on a girl in my life. And I was
Speaker 4: at an award show in the green room and she
Speaker 4: walked by, and something in me. I just got up
Speaker 4: and said, hi, I'm Dick and hired her. She was
Speaker 4: makeup artists, so I hired her and the wound her
Speaker 4: from there. But it's the first time in my life
Speaker 4: I had the guts and it was meant to be.
Speaker 4: We've been together eleven years.
Speaker 5: We've been married eleven but I've known you since in
Speaker 5: two thousand and six.
Speaker 4: It's great. She takes good care of me and we
Speaker 4: sing together all the time.
Speaker 1: Well, you know what you are doing exactly now. My
Speaker 1: wife is three years older than me, but you are
Speaker 1: doing exist. The two of you seem to have. The
Speaker 1: age doesn't seem.
Speaker 2: To be a thing.
Speaker 1: They are doing exactly what my wife and I do.
Speaker 1: You play together, you laugh together, you travel together, you
Speaker 1: work together. The yin to the yang. If you forget something,
Speaker 1: she reminds you.
Speaker 2: If you you know it's it's.
Speaker 1: Do you ever get bothered by people's first reactions to
Speaker 1: the two of them?
Speaker 5: I forget, I really do, and then they'll do, you know,
Speaker 5: the typical whatever, gold digger or whatever, and it's like, really,
Speaker 5: I mean, if I feel sorry for you that you
Speaker 5: see if you can't see it, then I feel like
Speaker 5: there it's on you because it's like hard to deny
Speaker 5: our whatever we have is special and people like to
Speaker 5: be around it.
Speaker 1: And then they I don't know, Well, you know.
Speaker 3: What Jason said coming in that he's got joy and
Speaker 3: you you're you can't fake laughing at somebody and enjoying
Speaker 3: somebody else's experience. And I watch you enjoy his, he
Speaker 3: enjoys yours and Dick been put together for anar and
Speaker 3: you're right, we're never going to be that guy.
Speaker 2: Before I let you go, and I know you're not.
Speaker 1: You're not really an advice giver because I've asked you
Speaker 1: a couple of times. But is there do you feel
Speaker 1: that other than just it's who you are? Is there
Speaker 1: a particular mantra or an outlook on life that allows
Speaker 1: you to have this spirit, this fullness, this enjoyment of
Speaker 1: everything At a time when most people Dick, they never
Speaker 1: get there, or if they get there, their struggle. You know,
Speaker 1: and you're and you're you're a different soul. Is there
Speaker 1: anything that is that that makes that true for you?
Speaker 4: I don't know. I love to laugh. I love.
Speaker 2: It's hard to do something else when you're laughing that.
Speaker 4: I always got friends around me who had a sense
Speaker 4: of humor, you know, who enjoyed themselves. I stayed away
Speaker 4: from people who.
Speaker 3: Were such a You really are a joy and and
Speaker 3: you spread so much joy. Like I said, with this guy,
Speaker 3: I love when people smile when they could. It could
Speaker 3: be somebody in a bad mood and they smile.
Speaker 2: Same with you. Everybody here.
Speaker 3: This is a studio that sees a lot of celebrities
Speaker 3: come in, you know, and now that's okay. You walk in, man,
Speaker 3: and everybody wants to meet you, wants to but there
Speaker 3: it's also like touching happiness.
Speaker 2: It's like happiness.
Speaker 5: That you He's definitely rubbed off I It was more
Speaker 5: cynical before I met him, and he just makes me
Speaker 5: always see the glass full or half full, and always
Speaker 5: say I never I love singing privately or like on karaoke.
Speaker 5: After a couple I would never sing in public ever,
Speaker 5: And I sing all the time out and that that's magic.
Speaker 2: Yeah, well I want to I'm gonna tell you this
Speaker 2: one last thing.
Speaker 1: You probably know this, but you have not only reached
Speaker 1: ripe old age, you have actually, I think reached immortality
Speaker 1: because that man that I introduced you to before we
Speaker 1: sat down, my son, Gabe, who's thirty one years old,
Speaker 1: when he was two years old, he watched Chitty Chitty
Speaker 1: Bang Bank for the first time and he became mesmerized
Speaker 1: by the old Bamboo. And Gabe had a habit. He
Speaker 1: did this with Donald O'Connor's make him Laugh Too, where
Speaker 1: the first time he saw it, even though he was two,
Speaker 1: he kept wanting to watch it and just that number
Speaker 1: again and again and again, and then he would pick
Speaker 1: up because we we had little props and things in house,
Speaker 1: he would pick up a prop and try and do it.
Speaker 1: At two years old, he would stand in front of
Speaker 1: our TV set and do the old Bamboo with you.
Speaker 4: Oh my god.
Speaker 1: And he knows just about everything you've ever done. And
Speaker 1: he's a new dad. I have a seven month old graduates.
Speaker 1: He's exhausted. He's right, he said. Mom told me Dick
Speaker 1: Van Dyke's coming into the studio today. I said, that's right.
Speaker 1: He went, is there any way? It would be okay
Speaker 1: if I so. That is true of children you will
Speaker 1: never meet, You will be what you have done.
Speaker 2: And it is the reason.
Speaker 1: Why I could tear up when I'm talking to you.
Speaker 2: I think you remember this.
Speaker 1: You came to see Marty's short and I did the
Speaker 1: producers here in Los Angeles for almost a year. This
Speaker 1: is Hollywood. We had celebrities in the audience every night.
Speaker 1: We were thrilled, but we never acknowledged them. We didn't,
Speaker 1: you know. It was like we didn't want to embarrass them.
Speaker 1: The night that you were at the show, we found
Speaker 1: out at intermission you were there, and Marty came into
Speaker 1: my room and he went, we have to and I went,
Speaker 1: we absolutely have to. And my introduction to you, and
Speaker 1: Marty's introduction to you for that audience was ladies and gentlemen,
Speaker 1: We've never done this. We've had we've had royalty in
Speaker 1: this audience. We have never done this. But there is
Speaker 1: a man here tonight who has done everything there is
Speaker 1: to do in this business, has done it better than
Speaker 1: anybody else, and it will live for eternity. Please say
Speaker 1: hello Vandyke and that audience. I mean, forget, we had
Speaker 1: just killed ourselves for two and a half hours. That
Speaker 1: audience from having you there and acknowledged, gave you a
Speaker 1: standing ovation on I'm not kidding.
Speaker 2: It went for two minutes.
Speaker 4: My god, and remember that part, Dick Van Dyke.
Speaker 1: I am just going to tell you the world. The
Speaker 1: world loves you. And I don't know how many people
Speaker 1: that can be said of. And I'm by half of
Speaker 1: my childhood, my children's childhood, my grandson's childhood. God, thank
Speaker 1: you for a body of work that is extraordinary and
Speaker 1: it was well you certainly made it effortless.
Speaker 2: My friend.
Speaker 4: I have to tell you that you guys did your
Speaker 4: show with no audience.
Speaker 2: But we did have an audience. We didn't have an audience.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I've always inmired people who could work without an audience.
Speaker 4: We had an audience. I don't know what to do. Yeah,
Speaker 4: I don't have an audience.
Speaker 1: We actually did half and half anything we shot outside
Speaker 1: we didn't have an audience, but then anything on a
Speaker 1: set or we had a live because we I was
Speaker 1: working for stand up comics and they wanted to hear
Speaker 1: those laughs.
Speaker 2: Yes, you know, yeah, I.
Speaker 4: Don without an audience, reaction how people You bet. You
Speaker 4: have to.
Speaker 3: Have an audience here, and you have a whole new
Speaker 3: audience because of the podcast. By the way, you got
Speaker 3: a kid from Philadelphia in a rowhome who never thought
Speaker 3: he'd be in LA wanted.
Speaker 2: To be in show business because of Rob Petrie. And
Speaker 2: I remember the.
Speaker 3: Episode were you thought you got the wrong baby? Oh yeah,
Speaker 3: and it was so cutting edge. You went to the
Speaker 3: hospital and the couple you thought mixed up the baby
Speaker 3: was an African American.
Speaker 2: Nobody's seen that on television either at that.
Speaker 4: Time, so that was the longest laugh I've ever experienced.
Speaker 4: We had to cut the cameras the audience wouldn't stop,
Speaker 4: and the network was against us doing that show. They said, yeah, Brad,
Speaker 4: couple walked in and they exploded. I wanted to minutes.
Speaker 2: I wanted to be in television.
Speaker 3: And my friend Rick Okay, who created Major Dad, he said,
Speaker 3: I used to watch Dick Van Dyke and his mother
Speaker 3: used to say, go to your homework, and he'd say,
Speaker 3: this is my homework.
Speaker 1: The impact ladies and gentlemen, Dick and Arleann, thank you
Speaker 1: for having fun.
Speaker 2: Well, sir, that was as good as it gets. Right. Yeah,
Speaker 2: he's pretty.
Speaker 3: I don't know if people listening or watching will get it,
Speaker 3: but a ninety seven year old man who's got to
Speaker 3: be challenged sat there smiling.
Speaker 2: It's what you thought he would be, and joyous.
Speaker 1: From the minute he came through the door in the
Speaker 1: studio and to the minute you know he's gone. It's well, listen,
Speaker 1: he's everything. It's one of those things. We were just
Speaker 1: mentioning the other day about Fred Rogers, and it's one
Speaker 1: of those things where you go, it can't be in radio.
Speaker 3: I was cutting up the fact, you know, because back
Speaker 3: then then they shock chocky jays. You're cutting hahaha, making jokes.
Speaker 3: He came in studio, I became a nine year old boy. Yeah,
Speaker 3: because when somebody is a guileless and it's real, it is,
Speaker 3: it takes you over. It's hard to not He's so
Speaker 3: commanding and they're so quiet. Hi, Peter, why would you
Speaker 3: do it?
Speaker 1: And oh my god, it was such a I'll tell
Speaker 1: you a story about him in a second that will
Speaker 1: tell you what he's really just fully like. But David,
Speaker 1: any revelations from our time with mister van Dyke and
Speaker 1: his lovely wife, Well, first of all, that was that
Speaker 1: was amazing.
Speaker 2: It was great to just be a part of that.
Speaker 6: But you know, it's interesting.
Speaker 7: I was writing an intro to this segment and I
Speaker 7: was going to refer to mister van Dyke as an octogenarian.
Speaker 7: But then I realized octogenarian means in the eighties, right
Speaker 7: in the eighties, because generally I thought that it was
Speaker 7: like just referred to an old person.
Speaker 2: So octose eight and Lena.
Speaker 6: So what do you call someone in their nineties?
Speaker 4: Rare?
Speaker 8: It's not sep, it's not oc it's a I don't know,
Speaker 8: it's a nonagenarianogen right, that's right.
Speaker 2: But that makes it sound like you didn't make it, yeah, rite.
Speaker 6: But gee he did.
Speaker 7: And that sort of got me to think, what are
Speaker 7: some of the other nonagenarians out there that have contributed
Speaker 7: greatly in their nineties? Okay, Tony Bennett, who was actually
Speaker 7: ninety six right now, who was performing and doing albums
Speaker 7: into his nineties. In fact, is the latest release, which
Speaker 7: was twenty twenty one's Love for Sale with Lady Gaga,
Speaker 7: peaked at number eight on the US Charles.
Speaker 2: Love for Sale advertising love US. I don't know that,
Speaker 2: were you goga? Yeah? No, I don't get that. But
Speaker 2: how beautiful? Is that that she honored him to pretty many? Yeah? Oh,
Speaker 2: and he apparently adores her.
Speaker 6: That was a love Tony Bennett.
Speaker 7: We also have one of mister van Dyke's contemporaries, a
Speaker 7: David Attenborough, who is also ninety seven, the British naturalist.
Speaker 1: The world the world goes to bed standing up as
Speaker 1: do I.
Speaker 3: I can't wait to see how many impersonations stas of
Speaker 3: I'm David.
Speaker 1: I gotta have to do the rich little thing of
Speaker 1: announcing who I am, so there's no mistake.
Speaker 2: Who else can I do? David?
Speaker 4: Well?
Speaker 6: It gets a little more tricky here. I'll also have
Speaker 6: fashion icon iris Atfell.
Speaker 2: Who iras that Feld? I is sad Feld I invented
Speaker 2: the button.
Speaker 3: That's pretty good, right, that's pretty good if her she's
Speaker 3: very lady with giant glasses.
Speaker 2: Yet and what a character, and she's fashion yet you
Speaker 2: bet I am?
Speaker 6: That's right now.
Speaker 2: I think I'm doing a little interesting.
Speaker 6: She actually ran Back is a centenarian.
Speaker 2: Because she's less.
Speaker 6: Yes, she's one on one in her nineties.
Speaker 7: She was actually signed as a model by the talent
Speaker 7: manage company I AMG at the age of ninety seven,
Speaker 7: so she was I.
Speaker 2: Remember her Sports Illustrated Swims cup.
Speaker 7: Go on, David, Yes, I believe that was Martha Stewart.
Speaker 7: But right, that's right, but not quite not quite her
Speaker 7: in her nineties yet. Yeah, we have another one. Gladdie's Burrow,
Speaker 7: who is better known as the Gladiator, is the oldest.
Speaker 6: Woman ever to finish a marathon at ninety two.
Speaker 2: I'm not gonna lie. I don't know what her voice
Speaker 2: sounds like. Right, I'm hard. How long did it take
Speaker 2: her to finish themarsa right days? Nine hours?
Speaker 6: That's exactly right. That's exactly what they said at the thing.
Speaker 2: That's amazing.
Speaker 6: We also now get this because Jason, I think that
Speaker 6: this might inspire you.
Speaker 2: It might inspire you.
Speaker 7: You Shearra Mirah, who is a Japanese mountain climber, became
Speaker 7: the oldest person to reach the summit of Mount Everest
Speaker 7: at the age of eighty.
Speaker 6: But then again, he did it at ninety to find
Speaker 6: his hand.
Speaker 1: I ten years ago, I might have attempted that invitation,
Speaker 1: but now we'd be off the air.
Speaker 2: I thought were saying he actually climbed. Ever at eighty seven,
Speaker 2: I guess small credit because he didn't come down till my.
Speaker 4: Wow.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's very impressive. I I it's amazing that people
Speaker 3: don't have this the fear that you know what I'm not.
Speaker 3: It's like shot or they do stuff and they're not
Speaker 3: worried that I'm not going to make it. They just
Speaker 3: attack the day. It's pretty amazing.
Speaker 2: Well, that's what I was going to say.
Speaker 1: I would like, here's my goal after after you know,
Speaker 1: chatting with Dick Van Dyk. I'm a pretty blessed guy
Speaker 1: right now, at sixty three.
Speaker 2: I feel good.
Speaker 1: I go to my doctor every year. He goes, You're terrific.
Speaker 1: There's nothing going on that I'm concerned about. I work out,
Speaker 1: I have a lovely family. I adore my wife of
Speaker 1: forty three years. I think I already think I'm kind
Speaker 1: of an adorable grandfather, right, best friends working with my
Speaker 1: best friend? Right, yes, you bet you and and you know,
Speaker 1: years ago they said to me, what do you see
Speaker 1: yourself doing when you're ready? I said, I'm going to
Speaker 1: be the most adorable grandfather because I'm tiny, I'm bold,
Speaker 1: nothing's going to get worse.
Speaker 2: I have cute stories. I'm and entertainer.
Speaker 1: That should be good, right, So I keep thinking when
Speaker 1: i'm if, i I'm knock. What if I get to
Speaker 1: be in my nineties the way both my parents were
Speaker 1: when they passed, I would like to think that I
Speaker 1: could be an effervescent, mindful, joyful, contributing, kind, generous person
Speaker 1: that spreads the kind of good will and love that
Speaker 1: an icon like Dick Van Dyke is able to be
Speaker 1: and has been all his life. But at ninety seven
Speaker 1: he is the platonic ideal of joy and grace.
Speaker 2: It's not gonna happen anyway. Thanks for joining us. We
Speaker 2: appreciate it.
Speaker 3: Wow wow, Well, I don't want to say your expectations
Speaker 3: you devastated.
Speaker 2: And what do you see yourself doing? At ninety seven
Speaker 2: you're saying, where are you? Where are you? Picked me
Speaker 2: up a bit? You're gonna pick me up lunch?
Speaker 1: If this is what I have to look forward to
Speaker 1: at ninety seven, I'm pulling the plug. At ninety you
Speaker 1: know what I'm gonna get off your Oh god, Now
Speaker 1: I'll end the show the way I probably would at
Speaker 1: aged ninety seven.
Speaker 2: Thank you for listening to What is the show really? Whatever?
Speaker 1: If you want to watch it again, we come out
Speaker 1: every what day? Tuesday Tuesday, every tuesdays, Well, you can
Speaker 1: watch it on the hard app the apple. We'll eat
Speaker 1: an apple wherever you get, whatever you got. If you're
Speaker 1: watching it on the tube with a with a you
Speaker 1: like it and pick it up so you can watch
Speaker 1: it again. And then there's a website. I don't know
Speaker 1: what it's get there. I don't know how to get there.
Speaker 1: I've never looked at it. I'm ninety seven. I've never
Speaker 1: seen it. I never people write in, I never write back.
Speaker 1: I want to thank Laurie, she's been dead ten years.
Speaker 1: I want to thank Dave David already. Yeah, he doesn't
Speaker 1: even know who he is either.
Speaker 3: And you did anybody else work on the show who
Speaker 3: we can't pay?
Speaker 2: What's your name? Peter? That's right, Peter. Thanks for watching
Speaker 2: that movie comes true. If this comes true, we are
Speaker 2: I'm a day away. I'm a day all.
Speaker 1: Thanks mister van Dyke. I'll tell you, oh one last
Speaker 1: thing about Dick Van Dyke. This is my parting shot.
Speaker 1: You ready I do the movie of Bye by Bertie
Speaker 1: for television. I'm in my thirties, of the early thirties, forty.
Speaker 1: I do they call, They say, we want you to
Speaker 1: do the movie of Bye by Bertie.
Speaker 2: I go sure?
Speaker 1: I think they're talking about the Paul Lynde role. They
Speaker 1: give me his role. I play Albert Peterson in the
Speaker 1: TV movie of Bye Bye Bertie with Vanessa Williams.
Speaker 2: I do the movie. I've never met Dick van Dyke
Speaker 2: at that point.
Speaker 1: The next day after it airs, a bottle of champagne
Speaker 1: and the bouquet of roses winds up at my house.
Speaker 1: I don't know how he got my address with a
Speaker 1: card that says, dear Jason, now I know how to
Speaker 1: play the part.
Speaker 2: You were magnificent, love sick man. That is an amazing guy.
Speaker 1: That is grace, and that's why this has been special.
Speaker 1: Thanks for being with us. We'll see you next week.