WEBVTT - John Lithgow discusses playing Roald Dahl, appearing on Bake Off - and sings with Ruthie 0:00:00.120 --> 0:00:03.680 You are listening to Ruthie's Table four in partnership with Montclair. 0:00:04.680 --> 0:00:09.080 Neither John Lithgow nor I remember how we met. I 0:00:09.240 --> 0:00:12.119 think it was about twenty years ago. He thinks more. 0:00:12.600 --> 0:00:15.520 I think it was a roommate from Harvard who introduced us. 0:00:15.880 --> 0:00:18.799 He thinks a friend from New York. In fact, it 0:00:18.880 --> 0:00:22.560 doesn't really matter. What matters is that John is living 0:00:22.600 --> 0:00:27.160 in London performing in Giant, de rave reviews, playing Roles 0:00:27.280 --> 0:00:30.880 Doll and He and his wife, Mary Yager's house is 0:00:30.920 --> 0:00:34.919 around the corner from mine. On Sunday nights, the one 0:00:35.000 --> 0:00:38.720 day he's not on stage, they've come to supper. Our 0:00:38.760 --> 0:00:42.840 friends love them, my children love them, and I love them. 0:00:43.159 --> 0:00:46.000 John has played an alien, a cardinal, a serial killer, 0:00:46.080 --> 0:00:50.599 a prime minister, presidents, and though I've seen Giant three times, 0:00:50.720 --> 0:00:53.800 the role I know best is John as a friend. 0:00:54.280 --> 0:00:57.920 He is quite simply the nicest man I know. John 0:00:57.920 --> 0:01:00.320 and I share a belief in the joy of song, 0:01:00.880 --> 0:01:04.160 and right now in this world we are looking everywhere 0:01:04.200 --> 0:01:08.199 for joy. His albums for Children, Singing in the Bathtub, 0:01:08.680 --> 0:01:11.560 Farkl and Friends, and The Sunny Side of the Street 0:01:12.160 --> 0:01:15.880 are beautiful. I've been listening to him singing everybody eats 0:01:16.319 --> 0:01:20.160 when they come to my house very relevant and my 0:01:20.360 --> 0:01:26.520 favorite getting to know You both particularly relevant today. Right now, 0:01:26.680 --> 0:01:29.039 we're at the River Cafe on Father's Day to talk 0:01:29.080 --> 0:01:33.199 about acting and food, theater and food, film and food, 0:01:33.600 --> 0:01:34.679 family and food. 0:01:35.040 --> 0:01:39.679 Who cares? How we bet? We're together? Now? Should we sing? 0:01:39.720 --> 0:01:40.920 Getting to know you. 0:01:41.120 --> 0:01:44.880 And getting to know you, getting to know. 0:01:46.959 --> 0:01:49.800 You, getting to like. 0:01:49.880 --> 0:01:53.320 You, and getting to hold you like me. 0:01:54.960 --> 0:01:58.720 To Suddenly I'm right. 0:01:58.800 --> 0:02:04.440 And easy because of the. 0:02:07.120 --> 0:02:10.280 Things I'm learning about you. 0:02:10.960 --> 0:02:13.160 Day by. 0:02:14.680 --> 0:02:21.720 Day. When have you begun an interview like that? Yeah? 0:02:22.000 --> 0:02:23.800 I will confess that. 0:02:23.960 --> 0:02:27.040 Richard Y Grant was here about a few months ago, 0:02:27.639 --> 0:02:30.440 and in the middle of it we started talking about 0:02:30.960 --> 0:02:35.040 My Fair Lady and he played Henry Higgins, and so 0:02:35.480 --> 0:02:38.240 he said to me, what's your favorite song for my 0:02:38.320 --> 0:02:41.640 Fair Lady? I said, that is so easy because for me, 0:02:42.560 --> 0:02:45.120 I've grown accustomed to her face, and so he sang it. 0:02:45.160 --> 0:02:46.120 Do you know that I. 0:02:46.040 --> 0:02:47.079 Did play that part? 0:02:47.160 --> 0:02:48.000 Did you play Henry? 0:02:48.520 --> 0:02:48.800 Once? 0:02:49.240 --> 0:02:52.720 At the Hollywood Bowl there was a full production put 0:02:52.760 --> 0:02:57.040 together for one evening, and because I had grown up 0:02:57.080 --> 0:02:58.720 listening to the original cast. 0:02:58.520 --> 0:03:00.840 Album as you clearly did. 0:03:01.160 --> 0:03:01.240 I. 0:03:02.919 --> 0:03:06.360 Performed it with ten days rehearsal. It was fully costumed, 0:03:06.360 --> 0:03:10.480 with the entire Los Angeles Philharmonic up on stage with us, 0:03:11.240 --> 0:03:17.440 and oh my god, Roger Daltrey played. 0:03:17.400 --> 0:03:22.680 Doolittle and packed Lighthead played. 0:03:22.360 --> 0:03:26.520 Pickering, all these Rosemary Harris played Missus Higgins. 0:03:26.800 --> 0:03:28.120 Remember that was Melissa Era. 0:03:28.560 --> 0:03:31.000 Yeah, and I think we performed it for about nineteen 0:03:31.080 --> 0:03:35.000 thousand people at the Hollywood Bowl. And you know, the 0:03:35.600 --> 0:03:42.560 the magnified, the amplified voices on stage, they sort of 0:03:42.640 --> 0:03:45.200 hit like two seconds later way up at the back, 0:03:46.120 --> 0:03:49.680 and so you would tell a joke and the laughter 0:03:49.720 --> 0:03:55.680 would roll up the hill. It was the most amazing experience. Oh, 0:03:55.720 --> 0:03:59.800 it was fantastic. I always wished that they would ask 0:03:59.840 --> 0:04:02.240 me to do it again for a run somewhere because 0:04:02.280 --> 0:04:03.520 it is the perfect music. 0:04:04.680 --> 0:04:06.720 You know that for me, Well, you'll have all different ones, 0:04:06.760 --> 0:04:09.240 but for me My Fair Lady and Guys and Dolls. 0:04:09.280 --> 0:04:11.000 I love the music from Guys and Dolls. 0:04:11.280 --> 0:04:13.520 But we're talking about it the other day with Greta 0:04:13.560 --> 0:04:15.960 and No and actually with Richard was saying, could you 0:04:16.600 --> 0:04:19.880 do My Fair Lady now? Because it is pretty misogynist, 0:04:19.960 --> 0:04:22.760 it does have a and they were saying, yes, why 0:04:22.800 --> 0:04:25.719 not have a play about a man who doesn't understand 0:04:26.120 --> 0:04:26.839 and his own. 0:04:27.040 --> 0:04:34.440 It was equally controversially back in those days. But Higgins 0:04:34.560 --> 0:04:43.599 is a George avatar and very kind of challenging, dangerous wit. 0:04:44.560 --> 0:04:48.080 I mean, it's kind of like playing role doll. You're 0:04:48.120 --> 0:04:53.640 startled by his savage. Well, it's just it's a savage wit. 0:04:54.279 --> 0:04:56.040 It's a willingness to be cruel. 0:04:56.680 --> 0:04:58.320 I can't a woman be more like a man? 0:04:58.440 --> 0:05:01.919 Yeah, exactly. I mean you have to consider the source. 0:05:02.400 --> 0:05:05.479 It's wonderful to play a part that's all in. That's 0:05:06.120 --> 0:05:08.760 that's how I always felt about playing Dick Solomon on 0:05:08.920 --> 0:05:12.720 Third Rock from the Sun. Just nothing but impulse, completely unedited, 0:05:13.160 --> 0:05:17.320 because he knew nothing about the proprieties of being a 0:05:17.400 --> 0:05:18.039 human being. 0:05:19.760 --> 0:05:21.880 Yeah, it's very. 0:05:22.400 --> 0:05:25.880 Yeah, watching you in the theater and being in the 0:05:25.880 --> 0:05:30.560 theater and having seen Giant? How does food enter your 0:05:30.600 --> 0:05:33.960 work day when you're thinking about if you're doing a matinee, 0:05:34.000 --> 0:05:35.920 do you start thinking about in the morning, are you 0:05:36.000 --> 0:05:37.080 going to have a breakfast? 0:05:37.160 --> 0:05:42.159 Or it's a catastrophe doing a play, especially a really 0:05:42.200 --> 0:05:46.200 demanding play like Giant, it's thrown everything off. I never 0:05:46.279 --> 0:05:48.840 know when to have a good meal because if you 0:05:48.920 --> 0:05:53.200 wait too late, you've got too full of stomach. When 0:05:53.279 --> 0:05:55.640 the show is over and you come home, you don't 0:05:55.640 --> 0:05:58.120 want to eat too much then because you've got to sleep. 0:05:59.720 --> 0:06:03.280 It's very confusing. I'm counting on Sundays. That's why I 0:06:03.360 --> 0:06:05.560 keep gravitating to the River Cafe. 0:06:07.040 --> 0:06:09.200 We're going to go and have lunch very soon. But 0:06:09.279 --> 0:06:12.000 if what you eat so like tomorrow, you're in on 0:06:12.160 --> 0:06:13.320 performance tomorrow night, do. 0:06:13.320 --> 0:06:15.960 You think you'll got a horrendous day tomorrow? Don't? 0:06:16.520 --> 0:06:17.960 Oh no, I'm sorry. 0:06:18.240 --> 0:06:21.240 I have entered into a sort of ven Diagram period 0:06:21.279 --> 0:06:26.159 of my schedule where I'm running Giant but doing prep 0:06:26.200 --> 0:06:30.960 work for Harry Potter and tomorrow Tomorrow I have wardrobe fittings, 0:06:31.000 --> 0:06:33.479 and Tuesday I have hair and makeup, and this is 0:06:33.520 --> 0:06:36.479 Dumbledore we're talking about, and then I have to race 0:06:36.560 --> 0:06:39.880 back into town to do the show both nights. Then 0:06:39.880 --> 0:06:42.279 I have two on Wednesday, so I don't know when 0:06:42.279 --> 0:06:42.960 I'm going to eat. 0:06:43.839 --> 0:06:46.520 I better go have a good lunch. And when you're filming, 0:06:46.560 --> 0:06:49.000 do you think about when you did you know movies? 0:06:49.400 --> 0:06:53.640 Movies are a luxury because you know they feed you 0:06:53.720 --> 0:06:58.520 well midday every day, and you're usually on. You're frequently 0:06:58.560 --> 0:07:02.359 on location where you're God, I did two months in 0:07:02.680 --> 0:07:03.160 Rome on it. 0:07:03.240 --> 0:07:07.400 I wanted to hear about that because I've heard from Stanley. Stanley, 0:07:07.520 --> 0:07:09.760 you and Sally did a tour of Tuscany, did you 0:07:09.920 --> 0:07:10.160 or not? 0:07:10.320 --> 0:07:10.480 Well? 0:07:10.520 --> 0:07:16.520 I went by myself around Tuscany, but following Rafe's itinerary. 0:07:15.840 --> 0:07:17.280 Yeah, he laid out where. 0:07:17.120 --> 0:07:17.680 I should go. 0:07:17.920 --> 0:07:23.800 Yeah, and uh, I mean doing doing a film in 0:07:23.960 --> 0:07:27.480 Rome with Stanley Tucci and Isabella Rossellini and Ray Fines. 0:07:27.560 --> 0:07:29.760 It was just tell me what would you do that 0:07:29.840 --> 0:07:31.760 would you film? And then go out to eat? 0:07:31.440 --> 0:07:35.080 And yeah, we ate at night and trust Everey we 0:07:35.160 --> 0:07:40.240 had were an amazing, funky hotel across the Tiber from 0:07:40.360 --> 0:07:44.080 trust every eating and drinking at the end of a 0:07:44.120 --> 0:07:48.040 long day of working. It was great, much much better 0:07:48.080 --> 0:07:48.840 than doing theater. 0:07:49.080 --> 0:07:49.520 Well maybe you. 0:07:49.480 --> 0:07:51.720 Should think about that, you know, when you when you 0:07:51.800 --> 0:07:54.520 choose what films is going to do. 0:07:56.040 --> 0:07:58.400 One of the first big roles I played in movies 0:07:58.560 --> 0:08:01.680 was obsession for Brian to Holm where we shot in 0:08:01.760 --> 0:08:06.400 Florence and New Orleans. And I asked him, Brian, did 0:08:06.400 --> 0:08:08.600 you did you pick the cities before you made up 0:08:08.600 --> 0:08:12.680 the story, and he said, yes, Where do you want 0:08:12.720 --> 0:08:13.120 to be on it. 0:08:13.280 --> 0:08:15.520 Where do you want to be Yeah, exactly, Well you're 0:08:15.520 --> 0:08:17.360 going to be in London, which is going to be great. 0:08:17.480 --> 0:08:20.640 Sow When do you start doing the Harry Potter We 0:08:20.680 --> 0:08:21.520 haven't right as. 0:08:21.360 --> 0:08:26.640 Soon as this, but I don't expect to be working 0:08:26.680 --> 0:08:28.520 as hard on that as I do on this. 0:08:28.760 --> 0:08:30.400 What does it feel like at the end of it? 0:08:30.480 --> 0:08:31.960 It's really exhausting. 0:08:32.880 --> 0:08:36.479 I mean, you're related by it, but it's completely exhausting. 0:08:37.320 --> 0:08:39.080 Have you ever done a play we had to eat 0:08:39.160 --> 0:08:39.680 on stage? 0:08:39.720 --> 0:08:39.800 Oh? 0:08:39.920 --> 0:08:42.839 Yes, Uh? 0:08:43.120 --> 0:08:45.320 Actually I made a great discovery when I played King 0:08:45.400 --> 0:08:48.640 Lear in New York at the Public Theater. The scene 0:08:48.640 --> 0:08:53.000 where he he sort of crashes his daughter's castle with 0:08:53.040 --> 0:08:57.560 his entire troop of knights, the director wanted me to 0:08:57.600 --> 0:09:02.199 sit down and eat, eat hard after the hunt, and 0:09:02.280 --> 0:09:05.880 the prop man came up with this ingenious device for 0:09:06.600 --> 0:09:13.199 eating on stage. He made these chunks of watermelon covered 0:09:13.200 --> 0:09:17.080 with food coloring. Looked exactly like a big slab of beef, 0:09:17.880 --> 0:09:22.880 and I would just pop gigantic square inches of watermelon 0:09:22.880 --> 0:09:26.920 into my mouth and they disappear instantly. So not only 0:09:26.920 --> 0:09:30.920 can you can you eat and speak Shakespeare at the 0:09:30.920 --> 0:09:34.040 same time, but you're also hydrating. 0:09:35.520 --> 0:09:39.599 And that's what we do in Giant. Don't tell anybody. 0:09:40.600 --> 0:09:45.079 They serve us salad sUAS well. That's thinly sliced watermelon. 0:09:47.800 --> 0:09:50.960 And I always I can always get everything down my 0:09:51.120 --> 0:09:56.079 gullet on que. There's about ten moments when I'm munching 0:09:59.040 --> 0:10:01.600 and it's all gone straight down, just in time. 0:10:02.040 --> 0:10:03.840 I think it was It wasn't Carrien Mulligan. 0:10:03.920 --> 0:10:08.000 It was someone maybe it was that had to cook 0:10:08.080 --> 0:10:09.840 and eat something made a pasta. 0:10:10.000 --> 0:10:11.960 I think it was maybe for her Pin to play. 0:10:12.000 --> 0:10:14.120 That was it was David Hare, David Hare. 0:10:14.200 --> 0:10:17.319 I think it was Skylight, the Skylight where they cook 0:10:17.480 --> 0:10:20.640 a pasta on stage. Yeah, and she described having to 0:10:20.720 --> 0:10:23.040 actually cook it and then then eat it. 0:10:23.040 --> 0:10:25.400 It's always wonderful when that happens on the stage. 0:10:25.480 --> 0:10:28.479 Yeah, smell it you. 0:10:28.559 --> 0:10:31.040 But I'm basically cheating up there on stage. 0:10:31.200 --> 0:10:33.679 Okay, we can cut that from this and we can 0:10:33.760 --> 0:10:35.480 tell them nobody's gonna like it. 0:10:35.840 --> 0:10:36.840 Ahead and share it. 0:10:37.160 --> 0:10:39.920 I just like to think about the early days your 0:10:40.120 --> 0:10:44.600 Your father was born in the Dominican Republican, Is that right? 0:10:44.800 --> 0:10:46.160 So what was that like? Did they? 0:10:46.520 --> 0:10:49.560 Well, it's a it's a kind of curiosity about of 0:10:49.600 --> 0:10:56.600 his history and mind. He was descended from two or 0:10:56.640 --> 0:11:01.600 three generations of Scott's. My nice Lithgo is a Scottish 0:11:01.679 --> 0:11:05.240 name who lived in the Dominican Republic. His father and 0:11:05.280 --> 0:11:10.000 his grandfather were both vice consuls of and he was 0:11:10.000 --> 0:11:14.400 born in Santa Domingo and grew up in Porta Plata, 0:11:14.800 --> 0:11:17.400 but only grew up until he was four and then 0:11:17.400 --> 0:11:19.800 he and then he went straight to Boston. And that's 0:11:19.880 --> 0:11:21.120 my real So. 0:11:21.800 --> 0:11:25.240 Your grandparents, yes, whom I never knew. 0:11:25.600 --> 0:11:29.360 I knew my grandmother, but not my grandfather. He died 0:11:29.360 --> 0:11:32.800 when my dad was four. So it's really just a 0:11:32.880 --> 0:11:35.240 curiosity of my biography. 0:11:35.600 --> 0:11:38.960 Did your mother cook food that maybe came from there 0:11:39.080 --> 0:11:41.240 or did she bring any Caribean food or. 0:11:42.400 --> 0:11:46.880 I would say the food in my household was very 0:11:47.000 --> 0:11:52.560 much Boston seafood. That was my father's absolute favorite food 0:11:52.679 --> 0:11:55.880 New England lobsters and clams and scollops. 0:11:57.080 --> 0:11:59.400 And my mother, she was from Rochester. 0:12:00.440 --> 0:12:03.200 I and my siblings had a crazy upbringing because my 0:12:03.280 --> 0:12:07.920 father was a regional theater artistic director and we lived 0:12:07.960 --> 0:12:11.400 in about eight different places, so he directed, he was 0:12:12.000 --> 0:12:16.320 he created and ran Shakespeare festivals in Ohio. I mean, 0:12:17.400 --> 0:12:21.160 another curiosity of my biography It's what has turned me 0:12:21.200 --> 0:12:24.800 into this peculiar hybrid between an American and an Englishman. 0:12:26.160 --> 0:12:31.680 And my mother just kept the house, kept the family 0:12:31.880 --> 0:12:35.960 together as we moved from place to place, and just 0:12:36.160 --> 0:12:42.959 was a very reliable kind of Fanny farmer cook. Yeah, 0:12:43.400 --> 0:12:48.840 I remember her cooking very well. I remember one of 0:12:48.880 --> 0:12:52.160 our my real hometown up until I was about twelve 0:12:52.200 --> 0:12:55.640 years old was Yellow Springs, Ohio. We lived in a 0:12:55.720 --> 0:13:00.840 house on Dayton Street, and it was full of fruit 0:13:00.920 --> 0:13:06.719 trees and an entire line of rhubarb along the along one. 0:13:08.679 --> 0:13:12.880 I don't know whether they inherited it. Certainly they inherited 0:13:12.920 --> 0:13:15.559 all the fruit trees, but were there was peach trees, 0:13:15.679 --> 0:13:18.440 cherry trees, apple trees. And she used to make the 0:13:18.480 --> 0:13:20.400 most incredible rhubarb pies. 0:13:20.760 --> 0:13:21.400 What was it like? 0:13:22.360 --> 0:13:25.959 It was all rub none of this strawberry rhubarb. 0:13:25.679 --> 0:13:30.400 Stuff, and just one of my favorite things growing up. 0:13:30.760 --> 0:13:32.000 Would you go pick the rubarbi? 0:13:32.320 --> 0:13:35.840 She picked the rubarb for her, and and it was 0:13:36.360 --> 0:13:38.920 I just remember family meals. 0:13:39.000 --> 0:13:40.400 Did you do all sit down at night? 0:13:40.800 --> 0:13:41.040 Yeah? 0:13:41.200 --> 0:13:43.079 How many brothers and I had? 0:13:44.040 --> 0:13:46.160 I have two sisters and a brother. 0:13:47.760 --> 0:13:51.520 A lot of work I was cooking for four Yeah. 0:13:51.280 --> 0:13:55.880 And they were they let's see about a fifteen year 0:13:56.120 --> 0:13:58.560 span between the first and the last. 0:13:59.000 --> 0:14:01.520 What about your dad was then? How much was he 0:14:02.400 --> 0:14:02.760 he was? 0:14:03.200 --> 0:14:06.559 Yeah, he was always home, but always in the theater. 0:14:06.800 --> 0:14:07.319 Yeah. 0:14:07.559 --> 0:14:09.120 I just that's how I remember him. 0:14:09.160 --> 0:14:13.760 And he had a crazy career that veered between the 0:14:13.760 --> 0:14:19.120 theater profession and the teaching profession, because it was just 0:14:19.920 --> 0:14:21.760 you know, if you're if you're in the theater, you 0:14:21.800 --> 0:14:25.800 have a crazy life. Sometimes you're employed, sometimes you're not. 0:14:26.440 --> 0:14:30.560 Sometimes you have to choose other work. Sometimes it's going great, 0:14:30.680 --> 0:14:32.760 and sometimes it's a catastrophe. 0:14:33.240 --> 0:14:36.400 He started this idea of doing because that's very different 0:14:36.400 --> 0:14:38.600 from being an actor, to have a business or a 0:14:38.640 --> 0:14:42.680 career going setting up a theater, doing Shakespeare, going from 0:14:42.760 --> 0:14:44.480 town to town, finding the theater. 0:14:45.200 --> 0:14:46.040 Yeah. 0:14:46.040 --> 0:14:50.080 Well it came out most of his theaters were university connected. 0:14:50.320 --> 0:14:54.080 He did a great Shakespeare festival that lasted eight years 0:14:55.320 --> 0:14:56.440 at Antioch College. 0:14:57.320 --> 0:15:01.040 Yeah, and he taught there and I see that's it. Yeah, 0:15:01.080 --> 0:15:02.120 And he. 0:15:02.000 --> 0:15:04.800 Actually college because it's quite. 0:15:04.680 --> 0:15:07.520 Very funky in the middle of Ohio. It's certainly the 0:15:07.560 --> 0:15:12.080 most lefty radical place in Ohio and it hasn't changed out. 0:15:12.120 --> 0:15:15.320 In the States. It always had of being very. 0:15:15.480 --> 0:15:21.120 Liberally, tremendously exciting place, and that was our hometown. And 0:15:21.120 --> 0:15:25.160 a lot of my friends were professor's children, and a. 0:15:25.080 --> 0:15:27.440 Lot of them were on the blacklist. You know. 0:15:27.480 --> 0:15:30.280 It was a greatness, was in the early nineteen fifties 0:15:30.360 --> 0:15:33.200 mcarthy era, and it was a badge of honor to 0:15:33.240 --> 0:15:35.360 have your father a blacklisted professor. 0:15:36.320 --> 0:15:38.960 My dad was in that world as well. Yeah, I 0:15:39.080 --> 0:15:41.840 love Do you know Howard Koch was Howard Koch as well? 0:15:41.840 --> 0:15:45.560 The writers we wrote Casablanca, And we lived in a 0:15:45.560 --> 0:15:47.680 small town upstate New York, Woodstock, and we were on 0:15:47.720 --> 0:15:50.760 a street literally our next door neighbor. Actually, that's one 0:15:50.760 --> 0:15:53.040 of the reasons I came to London is that Howard. 0:15:53.120 --> 0:15:55.760 I wanted to take time off and Howard, because so 0:15:55.840 --> 0:15:59.640 many writers at the time who are blacklisted came to England. 0:16:00.320 --> 0:16:02.480 Carl Foreman, Carl. 0:16:02.240 --> 0:16:04.800 Rice, maybe two. I think they were quite a lot. 0:16:04.880 --> 0:16:07.040 Ring Lardner Jr. Was quite a gang. 0:16:07.680 --> 0:16:08.120 A gang. 0:16:08.640 --> 0:16:11.480 So did you know that being in the world of theater, 0:16:11.560 --> 0:16:15.720 of your father setting up theaters, was this an influence of. 0:16:16.040 --> 0:16:18.560 Well, I was much more interested in being an artist 0:16:18.640 --> 0:16:22.040 when I was a kid, genuinely interested, and that was 0:16:22.520 --> 0:16:25.880 everybody assumed that was what I would do. But you know, 0:16:26.000 --> 0:16:28.760 we were very involved in the theater, Me and my siblings. 0:16:28.800 --> 0:16:32.560 We all performed, performed in the plays, and watched rehearsals 0:16:32.640 --> 0:16:36.320 day in and day out. Knew the whole Shakespearean cannon 0:16:37.120 --> 0:16:40.760 because he produced every single one of Shakespeare's plays, including 0:16:41.680 --> 0:16:44.160 Henry the Eighth and Timon of Athens. 0:16:44.400 --> 0:16:46.240 He must have been a great guy. 0:16:46.280 --> 0:16:50.760 He was a very genial, sweet, wonderful man. 0:16:51.200 --> 0:16:53.160 Yeah, but his parents supportive of him. 0:16:54.160 --> 0:16:56.080 He was a black sheep and my mom was a 0:16:56.120 --> 0:16:56.680 black sheep. 0:16:57.680 --> 0:17:00.480 When you went from theater to theater, town to town, 0:17:00.680 --> 0:17:04.320 you said you did, even though there were universities. Was 0:17:04.359 --> 0:17:07.080 it having to adapt to a new vice. 0:17:07.840 --> 0:17:10.480 It's kind of like being a service brat, except I 0:17:10.480 --> 0:17:13.720 didn't go to a service brat school. I was the 0:17:13.800 --> 0:17:18.080 new kid in public schools all over Ohio and Massachusetts 0:17:18.200 --> 0:17:22.439 and graduated from Princeton High School in Princeton, New Jersey, 0:17:22.520 --> 0:17:26.280 where my dad ran the MacArthur Theater. It was a 0:17:26.320 --> 0:17:30.600 crazy pretty much, starting in about fourth grade. 0:17:30.640 --> 0:17:32.960 I kept we just moved. 0:17:32.640 --> 0:17:34.400 And moved, moved, and did you keep painting? 0:17:34.880 --> 0:17:35.840 I kept painting. 0:17:36.440 --> 0:17:39.000 I mean, I was really serious, right, up until I 0:17:39.040 --> 0:17:42.080 went off to college, at which point I was the 0:17:42.119 --> 0:17:45.600 campus star. Like within the first week I was an 0:17:45.640 --> 0:17:46.679 experienced actor. 0:17:48.760 --> 0:17:51.680 Tell me about Harvard and going to university. First of all, 0:17:51.680 --> 0:17:53.720 do you remember the food? Can we talk about food 0:17:54.080 --> 0:17:54.960 in Harvard? 0:17:54.960 --> 0:17:58.160 They were all the cooks in all the dorms, were 0:17:58.200 --> 0:18:03.960 these wonderful Irish women who just slopped out the food. 0:18:05.200 --> 0:18:07.480 Did you walk around Cambridge and discover what it was 0:18:07.560 --> 0:18:10.160 like to have Greek food or other kinds. 0:18:09.920 --> 0:18:14.040 Of When I most vividly remember about food at Harvard 0:18:14.200 --> 0:18:18.720 was Elsie's, the sandwich shop in Harvard Square, and the 0:18:19.840 --> 0:18:25.160 Fresher's Special and the. 0:18:23.440 --> 0:18:25.680 Big fat roast beef sandwiches. 0:18:26.119 --> 0:18:26.720 Do you remember that? 0:18:27.119 --> 0:18:30.080 When I went to Bennington and so we had a 0:18:30.160 --> 0:18:32.080 turn off and I got a job at the Harvard 0:18:32.160 --> 0:18:34.520 Law School doing I don't know what I did. You know, 0:18:34.560 --> 0:18:36.840 I took books down from the shelves and kind of 0:18:36.840 --> 0:18:37.960 read a few reports. 0:18:38.040 --> 0:18:40.480 But I sold pretzels. You remember that pretzels stand in 0:18:40.520 --> 0:18:42.360 Harvard Square? Yes, yeah, I worked there. 0:18:42.600 --> 0:18:45.560 Maybe I sold you I bet you probably did. We're 0:18:45.600 --> 0:18:46.720 almost contemporary. 0:18:46.720 --> 0:18:49.520 Nobody knows that about my life. 0:18:49.640 --> 0:18:53.120 Pretzels, But I saw pretzels in Harvard Square. 0:18:53.600 --> 0:18:55.600 Ye, well I was supposed to do. I like doing 0:18:55.640 --> 0:18:57.560 that more than working in the Harvard Law School. 0:18:57.720 --> 0:18:59.119 Yeah, but I did get it. 0:18:59.359 --> 0:19:01.760 But it was very is a great atmosphere, and Harvard 0:19:01.800 --> 0:19:02.960 is very heroic these. 0:19:02.920 --> 0:19:05.159 Days, it is. Yeah, we could have a moment on 0:19:05.240 --> 0:19:05.680 that DEI. 0:19:05.760 --> 0:19:09.919 They'd be protecting our universities and standing up for Yeah. 0:19:09.680 --> 0:19:12.320 Yeah, were you active politically in those days? 0:19:13.160 --> 0:19:13.320 You know? 0:19:13.400 --> 0:19:15.879 I graduated in nineteen sixty seven and came off to 0:19:16.359 --> 0:19:20.720 London to study at Lambda, which pretty much separated me 0:19:20.880 --> 0:19:26.800 from all the political turmoil. I left the country just 0:19:26.880 --> 0:19:28.280 when everything flew apart. 0:19:29.320 --> 0:19:29.520 You know. 0:19:29.600 --> 0:19:32.280 Here I was in London in nineteen sixty eight, which 0:19:32.400 --> 0:19:36.480 until now was the most catastrophic here in America in 0:19:36.640 --> 0:19:41.919 recent American history. And ironically, at both moments here I 0:19:42.000 --> 0:19:45.480 was in England, reading all the news from back home 0:19:45.520 --> 0:19:49.000 and thinking, what is going on at the minute I leave? 0:19:49.320 --> 0:19:54.080 Yeah? 0:19:50.240 --> 0:19:56.840 You know. Imagine a state bottled olive oil chosen and 0:19:56.880 --> 0:20:00.679 bottled for the River Cafe, arriving at your door every month. 0:20:01.119 --> 0:20:04.879 Our subscription is available for six or twelve months, with 0:20:05.080 --> 0:20:08.720 each oil chosen personally by our head chefs and varying 0:20:08.760 --> 0:20:11.840 with each delivery. It's a perfect way to bring some 0:20:12.000 --> 0:20:15.359 River Cafe flavor into your home or to show someone 0:20:15.440 --> 0:20:18.400 you really care for them with the gift. Visit our 0:20:18.400 --> 0:20:22.639 website shop the Rivercafe dot co dot uk to place 0:20:22.680 --> 0:20:30.640 your order now. I came here in early sixty nine, 0:20:30.800 --> 0:20:33.560 at the end of sixty eight sixty nine, and I 0:20:33.640 --> 0:20:36.600 came with a you know, a group of friends, you know, 0:20:36.680 --> 0:20:40.480 boyfriends and friends who just escaping the draft. 0:20:40.520 --> 0:20:42.400 I always say that, you know, I'd. 0:20:42.200 --> 0:20:46.240 Probably agree that Vietnam was a class war because I 0:20:46.280 --> 0:20:49.800 you know, poor farmers, poor people from who couldn't didn't 0:20:49.840 --> 0:20:50.679 know how to get out of it. 0:20:51.119 --> 0:20:53.879 You know, we're drafted. I don't know anybody. 0:20:54.040 --> 0:20:58.520 I know somebody who went to Vietnam, for people from 0:20:58.680 --> 0:21:02.280 Williams or Dartmouth, but I don't know anybody who died there, 0:21:02.280 --> 0:21:03.800 and I hardly know anybody who went. 0:21:03.960 --> 0:21:08.760 Yeah, it's a real third rail of American society from 0:21:08.800 --> 0:21:13.520 that era. People were so burned by that board. Or 0:21:13.640 --> 0:21:17.159 whether they participated or whether they resisted, it's just this 0:21:17.440 --> 0:21:22.520 subject of deep confusion. And you're right. I was here 0:21:22.560 --> 0:21:29.960 in London at exactly that time. So many expaths and resisters, 0:21:30.000 --> 0:21:32.480 so many who were just confused, what do I do? 0:21:32.640 --> 0:21:35.000 What do I do next? I'm not going to participate 0:21:35.040 --> 0:21:35.320 in this. 0:21:35.960 --> 0:21:40.920 The people going to Sweden, trying to get to Canada, 0:21:41.359 --> 0:21:42.680 trying to go anywhere. 0:21:43.920 --> 0:21:47.320 And I remember, well Al Gore was one of them. 0:21:47.440 --> 0:21:52.560 Another one was Donald Graham, who who led Washington Post 0:21:52.600 --> 0:21:55.040 for so many years. They went to Vietnam. 0:21:55.240 --> 0:22:00.480 Yeah, John Kerry, John Carrey. 0:21:59.560 --> 0:22:00.359 Wonderful man. 0:22:00.440 --> 0:22:03.760 And and we thought, what is what's gone wrong with 0:22:03.840 --> 0:22:07.160 Donnie Graham? Because he he reoped for a second tour 0:22:07.200 --> 0:22:10.520 of duty? What has happened to him? And then he 0:22:10.600 --> 0:22:14.439 came back and joined the Washington, d c. Police Force. 0:22:14.560 --> 0:22:19.199 We thought he would you know, basically he was what 0:22:19.320 --> 0:22:23.200