WEBVTT - John Guare and Lisa Dwan Talk Theater with Alec Baldwin 0:00:05.440 --> 0:00:08.479 This is Alec Baldwin and you're listening to Here's the thing, 0:00:09.119 --> 0:00:12.560 My chance to talk with artists, policy makers and performers, 0:00:12.920 --> 0:00:17.079 to hear their stories. What inspires their creations, what decisions 0:00:17.160 --> 0:00:22.840 change their careers, what relationships influenced their work. Today I'll 0:00:22.880 --> 0:00:26.840 be talking to two theater artists. One writes plays and 0:00:26.920 --> 0:00:30.720 the other brings them to life. My first guest is 0:00:30.760 --> 0:00:34.720 the great American playwright John Guare, best known for his 0:00:34.800 --> 0:00:38.000 plays Landscape of the Body, House of Blue Leaves, and 0:00:38.120 --> 0:00:42.800 Six Degrees of Separation. Guare's absurdest style and use of songs, 0:00:43.080 --> 0:00:48.320 asides and monologus keeps his audiences on edge. Guare's good friend, 0:00:48.400 --> 0:00:51.160 the late Louis Mall wrote about Gware that his quote, 0:00:51.200 --> 0:00:54.600 brilliant at tearing apart the logical and the expected, make 0:00:54.680 --> 0:00:59.800 him stand pretty much alone unquote. A lifelong New Yorker 0:01:00.000 --> 0:01:02.760 where lives in Greenwich Village with his wife Adele. He 0:01:02.800 --> 0:01:06.039 writes every day anywhere he can, he says, to keep 0:01:06.080 --> 0:01:10.200 from getting sick. He's taught playwriting at Yale, Harvard, Princeton, 0:01:10.400 --> 0:01:13.639 n y U, and Juilliard. John Ware says teaching others 0:01:13.720 --> 0:01:18.560 ultimately helps his own work. I selfishly use the class 0:01:18.600 --> 0:01:21.240 to teach what I'm going through, to teach problems that 0:01:21.280 --> 0:01:23.600 I'm having that they don't know it. But if I'm 0:01:23.640 --> 0:01:27.360 having this last time having problems, well, no, like once 0:01:27.920 --> 0:01:30.160 many years ago I taught it Yale Black one to 0:01:30.240 --> 0:01:34.360 eighty five or something. I um, I was having trouble 0:01:34.520 --> 0:01:37.360 starting a play. I was having great trouble with exposition. 0:01:37.400 --> 0:01:39.920 I thought of all those nineteenth century plays, you know, 0:01:39.959 --> 0:01:42.520 where the butler comes to the two servants come in 0:01:42.520 --> 0:01:44.559 and they say, oh, you know, five o'clock, the master 0:01:44.720 --> 0:01:46.760 not home yet, and they just say yes ever since, 0:01:47.080 --> 0:01:49.320 you know, I mean whether or else the phone or 0:01:49.360 --> 0:01:51.880 the heroine, you know, the wife the fan picks up 0:01:51.920 --> 0:01:53.720 the telephone and says, no, no, no, we're not here 0:01:53.760 --> 0:01:56.080 because we're involved in this terrible divorce case and my 0:01:56.360 --> 0:01:58.200 but everything is fine with us and we'll be better, 0:01:58.280 --> 0:02:01.160 you know. And I could not figure out how to 0:02:01.280 --> 0:02:04.440 begin a play in a neat way. So I thought 0:02:04.440 --> 0:02:09.400 about Moss Heart said it's something rather true and fantastic. 0:02:09.440 --> 0:02:12.880 He said, the audience will give you fifteen minutes, will 0:02:12.880 --> 0:02:16.079 give any play fifteen minutes that they'll listen to it. 0:02:16.639 --> 0:02:20.520 But at the sixteen minute there is some connected whether 0:02:20.800 --> 0:02:25.280 to the base of your spine or whatever legs. You'll say, 0:02:25.280 --> 0:02:26.919 I either want to go on this trip or I 0:02:26.960 --> 0:02:28.919 don't want to go on this trip. So I said, 0:02:28.960 --> 0:02:31.359 I'm just going to take the first fifteen minutes of 0:02:31.400 --> 0:02:35.640 my favorite place and go through them. And I just 0:02:35.800 --> 0:02:38.680 taught the first fifteen minutes of The Homecoming, the first 0:02:38.680 --> 0:02:41.720 fifteen minutes of Waiting for Godot, the first fifteen minutes 0:02:41.760 --> 0:02:44.280 of the Cherry Ords, of the first fifteen minutes of 0:02:44.320 --> 0:02:46.440 Yours sty Every week we just say what do we 0:02:46.600 --> 0:02:49.360 learn in the first fifteen minutes of these plays? And 0:02:49.440 --> 0:02:54.960 with spectacular it was spectacular and something I'm still learning. 0:02:54.960 --> 0:02:56.639 It's something where I'm still funny. I still go back 0:02:56.639 --> 0:02:59.040 to that class. Do you find that it's that it's 0:02:59.040 --> 0:03:01.160 difficult to teach the went how to write? No, you 0:03:01.240 --> 0:03:03.480 only can help them to find. You can't teach them. 0:03:03.639 --> 0:03:05.400 All you can do is help them to say, to 0:03:05.480 --> 0:03:08.960 help them find their own voice, because young playwrights are clever, 0:03:09.440 --> 0:03:12.440 and they're fantastic, ventriloquous, and they can write a play 0:03:12.520 --> 0:03:16.160 that sounds like Sam Shepard or David Mammaged or Harold 0:03:16.760 --> 0:03:19.639 and Mimic mimic mimic, but to help them find their 0:03:19.720 --> 0:03:22.880 own voice. That is the key. And they might write 0:03:22.960 --> 0:03:26.080 a fifty page play and there might be four lines 0:03:26.120 --> 0:03:28.720 where you say, that's I've never heard that voice before. 0:03:29.000 --> 0:03:31.560 That's original. That's where you've got to find that where 0:03:32.040 --> 0:03:34.520 that's the task. Yeah, it's about finding your own voice. 0:03:34.639 --> 0:03:39.760 Why did you stop? Uh? It just got no fun. 0:03:40.240 --> 0:03:42.640 And it was the last time I talked was last year. 0:03:42.640 --> 0:03:46.560 I was writer in residence at Hunter, and Hunter to 0:03:46.680 --> 0:03:50.960 me was spectacular. Hunter was great because these were kids 0:03:52.120 --> 0:03:55.120 that of course that I mean, you know, to pay 0:03:55.120 --> 0:03:58.040 eight thousand dollars. The money was real. The money was real, 0:03:58.280 --> 0:04:00.840 and they would make take them seven or eight years 0:04:00.880 --> 0:04:04.520 to get a degree because they're working. And uh, you know. 0:04:04.560 --> 0:04:08.040 And there was one young woman who wrote a play 0:04:08.680 --> 0:04:11.720 about being trapped in the projects uptown, you know, And 0:04:11.760 --> 0:04:14.520 I said it, So this play was so interesting, I said, 0:04:14.560 --> 0:04:18.240 but you know, the problems that are in your play, 0:04:18.360 --> 0:04:20.680 I can't I can't sell them. But you know who 0:04:20.760 --> 0:04:23.240 has so dealt with your problems you're dealing with Samuel 0:04:23.279 --> 0:04:26.800 Beckett read Waiting for Good Reading, you know, endgame, trying 0:04:26.800 --> 0:04:29.239 to get out, And she said the most wonderful words. 0:04:29.640 --> 0:04:35.440 Who's Samuel Beckett? And that to me was because you 0:04:35.520 --> 0:04:40.839 get kids at unnamed schools of higher learning and you'll 0:04:40.839 --> 0:04:42.720 say so anybody, and they'll say, I know Samuel back 0:04:42.720 --> 0:04:44.960 and I know all about them. I know all about him. 0:04:45.680 --> 0:04:48.480 I took a class. They were going to graduate, you know, uh, 0:04:48.960 --> 0:04:51.400 but in ten days or so, and we had she 0:04:51.440 --> 0:04:55.200 was the last class. We were talking and it turned 0:04:55.240 --> 0:04:58.440 out that none of them in the class had read 0:04:58.520 --> 0:05:02.839 Madame Bovary, seen The Marks Blow this movie. And I said, 0:05:02.839 --> 0:05:05.320 you have no right to get this degree. You should 0:05:05.360 --> 0:05:08.080 say where. I'm sorry, I can't. I should until you 0:05:08.120 --> 0:05:10.840 go back and read and see at least you know, 0:05:11.160 --> 0:05:14.440 to see animal crackers, animal crackers or duck suit, no 0:05:14.600 --> 0:05:19.000 duck soup. They'd have to see because all modern heroines 0:05:19.080 --> 0:05:22.280 come out of Madame Bobery. Blanche Boy had a caple. 0:05:22.320 --> 0:05:27.160 They're all the daughters of Madame Bobery. And uh, it's 0:05:27.360 --> 0:05:30.440 um yeah, so, and but you'll say that each of 0:05:30.480 --> 0:05:32.760 them said, well, I know about Madame Bovary. I mean 0:05:32.760 --> 0:05:34.960 it's by Flowbert, I know all about the Marks Brothers. 0:05:34.960 --> 0:05:37.000 They're anarchic, right, yeah, And one doesn't speak and one 0:05:37.080 --> 0:05:38.440 is wise. Yeah, I know all about them, but have 0:05:38.440 --> 0:05:41.400 you ever seen No, I don't have to know about them, 0:05:41.440 --> 0:05:46.440 So I just got bored teaching. You grew up in 0:05:46.520 --> 0:05:49.080 Queen's You've got your a lifelong New Yorker. I'm born 0:05:49.120 --> 0:05:53.159 in Manhattan. I'll tell you so funny. We my parents 0:05:53.200 --> 0:05:56.320 lived in the four hundred block on eighties six Street, 0:05:57.400 --> 0:06:00.200 and they want to be closer to Columbia Presbyterian, where 0:06:00.240 --> 0:06:03.479 I was born. So they learned that the people who 0:06:03.480 --> 0:06:06.599 had built our apartment house on Stree had built the 0:06:06.600 --> 0:06:10.279 identical apartment house up on Fort Washington Avenue. So we 0:06:10.400 --> 0:06:13.920 moved when I was going to the same apartment, and 0:06:13.960 --> 0:06:17.120 then it was too far away from the beach, because 0:06:17.160 --> 0:06:19.120 I really called my home with the Atlantic, the East 0:06:19.160 --> 0:06:21.039 Atlantic Beach, or a place where I still go a 0:06:21.040 --> 0:06:23.719 house my father built with his buddies in nineteen and 0:06:23.839 --> 0:06:25.720 still I still have it. I still go there. It's 0:06:25.800 --> 0:06:28.520 great and that I called and I call home. That's 0:06:28.520 --> 0:06:31.840 where my friends are. And uh, and it was too far. 0:06:31.920 --> 0:06:33.920 It was too hard to get him. Fort Washington underworked 0:06:34.200 --> 0:06:37.840 Penn Station. So they learned that those builders that built 0:06:37.880 --> 0:06:42.720 the exact same apartment uh in Jackson Heights so they 0:06:42.760 --> 0:06:45.760 moved to the same apartment again with the furniture fit 0:06:46.480 --> 0:06:48.400 and so I grew up there because it was also 0:06:48.440 --> 0:06:50.640 in the same block at Saint Johanavar Grammar School, I 0:06:50.680 --> 0:06:53.320 didn't have to cross the street. Do you have any siblings, son? 0:06:53.800 --> 0:06:56.800 You were an only child? Absolutely? It was great. And 0:06:56.839 --> 0:07:00.760 then and then when you were parents year agoers were 0:07:00.760 --> 0:07:04.360 the estate in that way. They like musicals, only like musicals. 0:07:04.440 --> 0:07:06.400 What about you? What was the theater in your life 0:07:06.400 --> 0:07:09.080 when you were a child? Well, I mean it was magnificent. 0:07:09.320 --> 0:07:12.000 I mean, well sure an You get your Gun was 0:07:12.040 --> 0:07:15.640 the first show I saw and a ethel Merman and 0:07:15.680 --> 0:07:19.280 it was I can still remember. It was absolutely devastating. 0:07:19.520 --> 0:07:22.520 It was still was shocking that that could happen. And 0:07:22.520 --> 0:07:25.680 it was mainly the now racist I'm an Indian two 0:07:26.320 --> 0:07:29.440 with this great ballet by I found it years later 0:07:29.440 --> 0:07:33.600 by Eugene Loring. It was spectacular, I must say. It 0:07:33.680 --> 0:07:37.240 was terrifying. And because they were gonna put ethel Merman 0:07:37.280 --> 0:07:39.000 the tire up at the stake and they're going to 0:07:39.120 --> 0:07:41.440 burn her and eat her and everything, it was, oh 0:07:41.480 --> 0:07:44.560 my god. There was no business taking a little bit 0:07:44.560 --> 0:07:49.520 of time to burn. No, she would have gone up anything. Yeah, 0:07:49.640 --> 0:07:52.520 and uh no, we saw it, just saw musicals. I 0:07:52.520 --> 0:07:56.240 could see. I remember, like from my twelve thirteenth birthday, 0:07:56.280 --> 0:07:58.960 I could see one show. I could pick either King 0:07:59.000 --> 0:08:02.480 and I or wish you here? And which one did 0:08:02.520 --> 0:08:06.280 I pick? Well? I wish you were here because King 0:08:06.320 --> 0:08:09.760 and I had some old lady named Gertrude Lawrence who 0:08:09.760 --> 0:08:12.400 would always be around it. But I wish we had 0:08:12.440 --> 0:08:17.280 a swimming pool on stage, and I was died diving 0:08:17.320 --> 0:08:21.480 and swimming water ballets. It was great. And Eddie Fishers 0:08:21.480 --> 0:08:24.640 sang the hit song They're not making the Skies is 0:08:24.680 --> 0:08:28.080 blue this year, and I saw that and it was 0:08:28.840 --> 0:08:31.640 And then I started going to see plays and uh well, 0:08:31.640 --> 0:08:34.720 the TV hadn't taken off in the in the fifties, 0:08:35.240 --> 0:08:38.040 it was about to Were you a filmgoer as well? 0:08:38.080 --> 0:08:40.520 Did you enjoy films or was the theater always? I'll 0:08:41.080 --> 0:08:43.640 I didn't I tell the movie saved me because in 0:08:44.720 --> 0:08:48.960 nine my father had a heart attack. This was so 0:08:49.080 --> 0:08:52.200 great and he had to had to take a year 0:08:52.240 --> 0:08:56.400 off from work. And at the same time, his aunt 0:08:56.440 --> 0:09:00.760 who had raised him up in Allenville, New York, so 0:09:00.800 --> 0:09:03.560 we moved up there because my father loved his auntie, 0:09:04.720 --> 0:09:08.360 and so I missed a lot of school because my 0:09:08.400 --> 0:09:11.280 father checked the school up in allen Bool, New York, 0:09:11.800 --> 0:09:14.280 and they did not say the pledge allegiance to the 0:09:14.280 --> 0:09:17.160 flag or the our father. And my father said it 0:09:17.200 --> 0:09:20.080 was a commed den and it was better than I 0:09:20.120 --> 0:09:23.040 didn't go to school. Then went to a communist den 0:09:23.120 --> 0:09:25.319 and the nuns at Saint John Novar and Jackson. I 0:09:25.440 --> 0:09:29.040 just agreed with that. So we lived in Allenville good 0:09:29.080 --> 0:09:31.800 part of the time. But those last two years of 0:09:31.880 --> 0:09:35.719 grammar school and I went and I had nothing to do. 0:09:35.920 --> 0:09:37.280 I was given a homeware. I go down of the 0:09:37.320 --> 0:09:40.199 city every every a few weeks and take a test 0:09:40.320 --> 0:09:43.439 or something. But what was great there were two movie 0:09:43.480 --> 0:09:49.480 theaters in Allenville, the shadow Land and the Danbury, and 0:09:49.640 --> 0:09:52.079 I went every day to the movie's first short to 0:09:52.320 --> 0:09:55.400 in twelve o'clock, and it was Spectacle. Father went with 0:09:55.440 --> 0:09:57.560 you because he was convalescing from his art attack. Don't know. 0:09:57.760 --> 0:10:00.959 I went by myself. They didn't I just the little kid. 0:10:01.520 --> 0:10:03.360 They didn't ask the little kid up in ellen Though 0:10:03.760 --> 0:10:05.200 what he was doing going to the movies in the 0:10:05.200 --> 0:10:07.120 middle of the day. They knew everybody was a small. 0:10:07.200 --> 0:10:11.760 Everybody knew was my uncle Frank, my and Teen's husband 0:10:11.840 --> 0:10:14.199 had been the president of the bank, and everybody knew 0:10:14.679 --> 0:10:17.559 who we were, so I didn't have to pay. I mean, 0:10:17.600 --> 0:10:20.760 I was treated and Uncle Frank's bank on everybody's mortgage. 0:10:21.160 --> 0:10:22.920 So during the week I'd come back. We live in 0:10:23.000 --> 0:10:24.960 Jackson Heights. But then if we have an element would 0:10:24.960 --> 0:10:27.120 be like the King with the giant popcorn and a 0:10:27.280 --> 0:10:32.199 soda and your feet up. Oh it was pretty and 0:10:32.280 --> 0:10:34.320 I'd watched him twice. It was just great. And so 0:10:34.360 --> 0:10:38.439 the movie is literally saved my life. And I read 0:10:38.559 --> 0:10:43.600 and read and read, and I went to Georgetown in 0:10:43.679 --> 0:10:46.480 Washington college I had to. You weren't allowed to. Johnny 0:10:47.320 --> 0:10:50.640 was not a communist. Stand no, you owned the St. John's, 0:10:50.640 --> 0:10:54.199 Prepp and Williamsburg and uh. And then you know, talking 0:10:54.200 --> 0:10:58.240 about that, maybe going to Harvard, and they priests there said, Johnny, 0:10:58.280 --> 0:11:00.720 what's which. You go to Hall, but you get a 0:11:00.800 --> 0:11:05.760 great education and you lose your soul, or you go 0:11:05.840 --> 0:11:08.400 to Catholic college, so maybe it's not a grain win. 0:11:08.880 --> 0:11:10.920 It's okay, but you come out with your soul intact, 0:11:11.040 --> 0:11:14.720 which is more Diplomat the commencement, Jesus gives you the diploma. Wow, 0:11:15.400 --> 0:11:19.440 that's a great idea. Well, it was lucky when we're there. 0:11:19.520 --> 0:11:21.000 We had a smart class and that we had there 0:11:21.040 --> 0:11:23.440 was the first thing called an honors program. For the 0:11:23.480 --> 0:11:27.600 last three years you didn't major in anything specifically. Everybody 0:11:27.640 --> 0:11:30.720 had one specialty that they then would teach the other 0:11:30.800 --> 0:11:33.880 nineteen guys in the class. And we were spending a 0:11:33.960 --> 0:11:37.640 number of weeks on you know, on Henry James, and 0:11:37.640 --> 0:11:42.160 then we would go to uh Lobachevsky to remain in geometry, 0:11:42.240 --> 0:11:43.959 and then we'd go to history. You know. It was 0:11:44.000 --> 0:11:46.439 all so it was all it was a very grab 0:11:46.480 --> 0:11:50.880 bag education that was terrific. But not there. No, but 0:11:51.160 --> 0:11:54.520 because the national the well no, because I was writing, 0:11:54.559 --> 0:11:58.800 I started they had a second I can still remember 0:11:58.880 --> 0:12:01.040 the drama club there was was called what mask the 0:12:01.160 --> 0:12:05.000 Mask and Babble. How do you know that it's widely 0:12:05.040 --> 0:12:07.960 known Mask and Babble that you were affiliated with that? Really? 0:12:08.520 --> 0:12:11.920 I consider remember Kathy Eno, she was the only champion. 0:12:12.000 --> 0:12:14.240 He's there were many girls around George now, but there's 0:12:14.240 --> 0:12:16.800 this one girl, Kathy, and I started putting a sign 0:12:16.840 --> 0:12:21.600 up on a tree that said player and the first 0:12:21.640 --> 0:12:25.199 annual play running contest that Georgetown the masking Ball will presents. 0:12:26.040 --> 0:12:27.880 And I said, that's a sign. I took this. I 0:12:27.960 --> 0:12:33.760 took down and I wrote the play and and I yes, 0:12:33.800 --> 0:12:36.360 and I came in second because I wrote a comedy 0:12:36.400 --> 0:12:38.240 and the first play had to be serious, and the 0:12:38.280 --> 0:12:41.480 second play was a comedy. Second prize play was a comedy. 0:12:41.520 --> 0:12:43.360 And I wrote a play every year there and then 0:12:43.400 --> 0:12:46.520 I went to Yale, and but also the same ye 0:12:46.559 --> 0:12:48.800 for what play? Right? So he went to the graduate 0:12:48.840 --> 0:12:52.040 program A game? Yeah yeah, But I also, what did 0:12:52.040 --> 0:12:53.800 your father think about that? What did your favor where 0:12:53.800 --> 0:12:56.920 we were? Did your mother have an opinion? My parents 0:12:57.120 --> 0:13:01.800 were absolutely thrilled. My father said to me one thing. 0:13:01.840 --> 0:13:04.440 He said, I don't care what you do, Johnny, never 0:13:04.520 --> 0:13:07.319 get a job. Don't end up like me. He hated 0:13:07.400 --> 0:13:10.520 Wall Street. He shauld never be a wage slave. Just 0:13:10.640 --> 0:13:14.200 even keep it fairly legal if you can. But Mate, 0:13:14.200 --> 0:13:17.840 when I have one happy moment all day long, I 0:13:17.920 --> 0:13:21.120 wake up, he long goes off. I pushed this news button, 0:13:21.240 --> 0:13:24.600 roll over, sleep, have a deep sleep for another couple 0:13:24.600 --> 0:13:27.120 of minutes, and it goes and I'm so happy, and 0:13:27.120 --> 0:13:30.560 then it goes off again, and then my feet hit 0:13:30.640 --> 0:13:32.840 the ground. And it's downhill the rest of the day. 0:13:33.679 --> 0:13:37.080 That the Yale program is two years, three years, three years. 0:13:37.960 --> 0:13:41.160 It still is good God And and I all. I 0:13:41.240 --> 0:13:43.800 went there also because the draft was on in those days, 0:13:44.280 --> 0:13:46.040 and if I was if he weren't in grad school, 0:13:46.120 --> 0:13:50.720 you would have been drafted immediately. So I went to Yale. 0:13:51.080 --> 0:13:53.360 And Yale was just after George Holt was sort of 0:13:53.360 --> 0:13:55.120 like a little high school, you know. It was like, 0:13:55.679 --> 0:13:58.680 you know, very small. And I got to Yale and 0:13:58.880 --> 0:14:01.280 who spoke to us there about six weeks who came 0:14:01.320 --> 0:14:05.000 and spoke? Did everybody we want to hear? T? S Elliott? 0:14:05.000 --> 0:14:08.280 And I said, this is Yale is really different And 0:14:08.800 --> 0:14:10.440 it was great. I had a great It was very hard, 0:14:10.480 --> 0:14:12.079 but I had a great time there. And when you 0:14:12.160 --> 0:14:14.439 left there, what did you start? How did you start? Well? 0:14:15.800 --> 0:14:21.040 I was incredibly lucky. Tennessee. Williams was having something done 0:14:21.040 --> 0:14:23.080 at the play out of town. I don't know what 0:14:23.120 --> 0:14:26.280 it was, and Audrey what his agent was coming up 0:14:26.680 --> 0:14:29.680 to New Haven to work something out, and there was 0:14:29.720 --> 0:14:32.120 a store or something had rained or something, and the 0:14:32.160 --> 0:14:34.080 meeting was canceled and she came to the drama school 0:14:34.080 --> 0:14:35.720 and see what was on. And I had a play 0:14:35.720 --> 0:14:39.080 on and she signed me. So I graduated from Yere 0:14:39.160 --> 0:14:42.840 with Audrey Wood, who was the greatest agent in the universe, 0:14:43.360 --> 0:14:45.800 the one who discovered Tennessee Williams and built his career 0:14:46.480 --> 0:14:51.000 as my as my agent, and that really, uh, that 0:14:51.080 --> 0:14:52.840 was fantastic. Why do you why do you think she 0:14:52.920 --> 0:14:56.320 signed here? I hope because she liked my work? When 0:14:56.320 --> 0:14:59.920 when when she you had written? How many plays? When 0:15:00.040 --> 0:15:02.920 someone signs you out of Yale, you're just finished three years? 0:15:02.920 --> 0:15:04.840 And this is right out of Yale. You know I 0:15:04.880 --> 0:15:08.080 was in Yale. I was, I was under Then you 0:15:08.160 --> 0:15:10.080 make my point, you're still in Yale. She thought, she 0:15:10.080 --> 0:15:11.760 she has to show you. Do she read some work 0:15:11.760 --> 0:15:13.520 you've done. She didn't even read it. She just thought 0:15:13.520 --> 0:15:16.320 it had possibilities. And then when when you left Yale? 0:15:16.320 --> 0:15:18.560 What was the first play you had produced? And how 0:15:18.600 --> 0:15:21.680 long after you left Yale? Well, I got out of Yale? 0:15:22.240 --> 0:15:25.640 What year? In sixty three? She got me a job. 0:15:26.320 --> 0:15:28.680 She said, you don't have any money, and she said, 0:15:28.680 --> 0:15:30.000 I'm going to get you a job. I got your 0:15:30.080 --> 0:15:34.160 job at Universal Pictures, and I went out to California 0:15:34.560 --> 0:15:37.840 to work at Universal Pictures to make money. Yes, we're 0:15:37.880 --> 0:15:39.720 writing screens. I didn't know what it was. I would 0:15:39.760 --> 0:15:42.360 go out there to find out. And I got there, 0:15:42.880 --> 0:15:45.400 and what was waiting for me when I arrived was 0:15:45.440 --> 0:15:51.560 my draft notice. And because I still was under and 0:15:51.680 --> 0:15:56.000 so I literally, at the last minute got into the reserves. 0:15:56.800 --> 0:15:59.240 And then I got out of the service, and I 0:15:59.320 --> 0:16:02.560 realized I never wanted to be in California again. Why 0:16:02.840 --> 0:16:06.840 I hated it? What about it? It wasn't East Long Beach, 0:16:07.760 --> 0:16:10.680 East Atlantic Beach, East Atlantic Beach. My soul would have 0:16:10.720 --> 0:16:15.480 died in California. I just knew. I said, that's not 0:16:15.600 --> 0:16:17.280 very We had nothing to do with screen writing. I mean, 0:16:17.320 --> 0:16:21.200 I mean there was a movie life and uh back 0:16:21.280 --> 0:16:23.000 east As my friend said to me once where he 0:16:23.040 --> 0:16:24.680 was an agent. He said, I said, do you think 0:16:24.720 --> 0:16:27.200 so and so I didn't want to hire me and 0:16:27.200 --> 0:16:29.280 this one didn't want to hire me. This is, you know, 0:16:29.320 --> 0:16:32.120 back in the early two thousands. And I said, do 0:16:32.120 --> 0:16:33.640 you think this one doesn't want to hire me because 0:16:33.640 --> 0:16:35.400 they don't like me or they think I'm going to 0:16:35.520 --> 0:16:37.200 be difficult to work with? He says, no, I don't 0:16:37.200 --> 0:16:39.040 think that's that they think badly of you. He said, 0:16:39.040 --> 0:16:41.920 I think it's that they don't think of you at all. Yeah, 0:16:42.080 --> 0:16:44.200 and that's to me with l a like like everything 0:16:44.240 --> 0:16:47.800 burns bright. You get your three years of the tail 0:16:47.840 --> 0:16:50.320 of the comet streaming behind you, and then you're gone. 0:16:50.400 --> 0:16:52.160 I mean, nobody really really thinks of you. I mean, 0:16:52.680 --> 0:16:55.640 it's still one of the great moments in my life. 0:16:56.520 --> 0:17:01.120 It was so shocking and hilarious and I mean it 0:17:01.240 --> 0:17:04.359 was is that I was nominated for an oscar in 0:17:05.560 --> 0:17:09.240 Atlantic City and Adela and I went in, you know, 0:17:09.320 --> 0:17:11.600 to where it was held that year and there were 0:17:11.800 --> 0:17:18.280 five hundred photograph say two camera lights, lights, light lighte fantastic. 0:17:18.840 --> 0:17:21.240 I didn't win. We came out and there were the 0:17:21.280 --> 0:17:23.520 two D and fifty camera and waiting there and they 0:17:23.520 --> 0:17:25.680 saw a DELI came out and as if on stig 0:17:25.960 --> 0:17:29.800 all two cameras dropped. They just dropped to silence and 0:17:29.840 --> 0:17:33.320 waited for us to pass. It was jaw dropping. It 0:17:33.920 --> 0:17:36.119 was great. Right to the airport and going home. I 0:17:36.160 --> 0:17:39.200 did right. What was that experience like making that film? 0:17:39.400 --> 0:17:41.760 One of the greatest mom you enjoyed working with Mom? 0:17:41.840 --> 0:17:46.560 Louie became one of my best friends. We became great, great, 0:17:46.600 --> 0:17:48.879 great great friends. And what was the origin of that? 0:17:48.880 --> 0:17:51.880 They came to you had written the screenplay they hired. 0:17:51.880 --> 0:17:54.560 You know. I got a call one day and this 0:17:55.160 --> 0:17:58.240 man with an accent said, is this junkua I'm looking for? 0:17:58.280 --> 0:18:00.679 John said, yes, is he? And he said, did you 0:18:00.720 --> 0:18:03.520 write that play I would have seen last year at 0:18:03.520 --> 0:18:06.560 the Public Theater coll Landscape of the Body. I said yes. 0:18:06.600 --> 0:18:08.960 He said, I've been looking for you. I would like 0:18:09.000 --> 0:18:10.680 to talk to you about a project. If I said 0:18:10.840 --> 0:18:12.600 where he's where, I said, come over, I'm out here. 0:18:12.640 --> 0:18:15.359 So he came over to my apartment and he said, 0:18:15.640 --> 0:18:21.240 I have got money to do a thrillout with Susan 0:18:21.240 --> 0:18:27.119 Surrandon and an unnamed mail star. That is, there's a 0:18:27.160 --> 0:18:30.720 big tax thing in Canada right now where you get 0:18:31.520 --> 0:18:35.359 right off every every dollar invested in UH movie made 0:18:36.000 --> 0:18:37.679 part of it has to be shot in Canada, with 0:18:37.720 --> 0:18:42.440 the Canadians and with the Canadian Yes, And he said, 0:18:42.600 --> 0:18:46.200 the screen we just we have no screenplay. What I hope, 0:18:46.359 --> 0:18:49.040 It's just it's impossible. We have Susan Surrandon and a 0:18:49.119 --> 0:18:51.640 building full of Canadians and no, it was not even. 0:18:51.640 --> 0:18:53.280 And it was also what I loved about it was 0:18:53.560 --> 0:18:55.840 that it was the money was it was a rabbi 0:18:55.920 --> 0:18:59.800 from Winnipeg was in charge of the of the fun 0:19:00.280 --> 0:19:03.040 that was putting this together. Had come to Louie to 0:19:03.080 --> 0:19:06.400 direct thriller, and so he said, did I have any 0:19:06.400 --> 0:19:10.080 ideas from moving? And I knew that Louie I'd loved 0:19:10.080 --> 0:19:12.359 it because he was always made great documentaries. You know, 0:19:12.400 --> 0:19:16.520 he'd started out of life as Jacques Cousto's cameraman and 0:19:16.760 --> 0:19:19.480 you know, dope under this travel around the world diving 0:19:19.520 --> 0:19:23.080 under the sea to day the Calypso is Erica, that's right, 0:19:23.160 --> 0:19:25.720 the silent world. And they wanted to ask, you know, 0:19:25.880 --> 0:19:29.040 and our Jackson Heights neighbor when I was a kid, 0:19:29.119 --> 0:19:32.680 it was still my mother's my father's not since long dead, 0:19:32.800 --> 0:19:35.760 but our neighbor was a man named Tony Ray who 0:19:36.160 --> 0:19:40.239 was head of Resorts Internationally Chalfon Hadden Hotel, which was 0:19:40.320 --> 0:19:43.560 going to become the first the first hotel to go 0:19:44.080 --> 0:19:47.639 to turn into a casino called Resorts International. And my 0:19:47.760 --> 0:19:49.879 mother would listen to Dorothy all the time, saying how 0:19:49.920 --> 0:19:52.160 exciting it was a game that was coming to Atlantic City. 0:19:52.200 --> 0:19:53.880 Going to rescue this time was Tony and I had 0:19:53.880 --> 0:19:56.960 moved from the world off down to the Atlantic City 0:19:57.119 --> 0:19:58.720 and I was throwing it aways, and my mother bought 0:19:58.760 --> 0:20:02.520 stock in It's International and so and I kept reading 0:20:02.560 --> 0:20:04.399 about in the paper. It's how this whole city was 0:20:04.400 --> 0:20:06.399 going to change thanks to this, And I said, it 0:20:06.400 --> 0:20:08.560 seems to be really interesting what's going on down in 0:20:08.560 --> 0:20:12.080 the Atlantic City right now? So he said, let's go down, 0:20:13.600 --> 0:20:17.399 and we went down and Tony took us around and 0:20:17.560 --> 0:20:19.800 the first thing we saw was in we went into 0:20:19.880 --> 0:20:23.240 Resorts International and there was a clam bar, a wet bar, 0:20:23.840 --> 0:20:26.399 and there was all these good looking girls opening clams, 0:20:26.840 --> 0:20:29.679 shocking clams. So what's that, he said, Well, to prove 0:20:30.280 --> 0:20:33.320 that they are serious about they wanted to be card dealers, 0:20:33.359 --> 0:20:34.960 they have to work at a job like this for 0:20:35.040 --> 0:20:38.119 three months before they're able to take lessons, you know, 0:20:38.359 --> 0:20:41.760 learn how to become card dealers. I said that Susan Surandon, 0:20:41.840 --> 0:20:44.439 Susan Surrandon will shuck will chuck clam. That was the 0:20:44.440 --> 0:20:49.119 first image. Well that, yes, and her breasts and her 0:20:49.760 --> 0:20:53.080 her shoulders and anyway, so in that time we met 0:20:53.080 --> 0:20:56.040 Skinny Tomato, who was the number one mobster in town. 0:20:56.200 --> 0:20:58.760 It was a great, great day. We stayed up all 0:20:58.880 --> 0:21:02.200 night talking because there was so many rules in Atlantic City. 0:21:02.200 --> 0:21:04.639 What you had to do in order to qualify for banking, 0:21:04.680 --> 0:21:09.560 to make yourself legit. And I saw a book Atlantic 0:21:09.560 --> 0:21:13.280 City biker named Vicki gold Leby was sailed down there. 0:21:13.440 --> 0:21:16.320 I forgot her name. Yes, that's what it was. And 0:21:16.720 --> 0:21:20.320 there was a picture of a gangster's convention in al Capol. 0:21:20.440 --> 0:21:23.560 Was up at the top, like the far left corner. 0:21:23.600 --> 0:21:26.440 There was a young boy smiling in the gangster's convention. 0:21:26.480 --> 0:21:29.360 And I said, that's our male star. That's him as 0:21:29.359 --> 0:21:31.760