After Midnight: Reflecting on a Classic 35 Years Later

I wanted to be part of this world of art express myself to what was happening in the world I can only wish there were more experiences like this in my life this was one of those milestones a kind of privilege that it's almost as if it was a dream I find it very exciting to be around creative people and John Schlesinger was tremendously creative it was totally original it was beautifully made beautifully directed beautifully performed this part six minutes catapulted me there weren't any development executives we didn't discuss the the plotline or the any of that crap we just made the movie you know if you're enjoying the work it was exciting to make that movie John I just come off of two years working on this big big MGM movie far from the madding crowd and he really wanted something totally different he wanted to work with a real gutsy American writer on some American material Schlesinger and I had met years before that I'd seen the kind of loving and doubly liar and I just flipped for this guy's work and I flew to England to meet him a young American artist in London said Sean a book by James Leo Harley called Midnight Cowboy John told me about it and I said well what is this Midnight Cowboy is it like a John Wayne Western or something like that he said hardly you've read this and I did I came back the next day and I said whoa you can't it's great it's great it's outrageous you can't make this movie it's it's too was too x-rated and no one will ever make it no studio would touch it and he said precisely precisely I made up my mind I'm going to make it we talked maybe once or twice over the next year maybe two and then I got a call from him one day and he said look I've read a book said you're gonna hate it maybe but he said I really think we could make a wonderful movie out of this book would you read it I read the book and we had two or three transatlantic conversations and was clear that we were on the same page we talked about certain fundamentals uncompromised that the only way to do Midnight Cowboy was to really deal with it Waldo had written some wonderful pages for a story about a Vietnam draft dodger which Jerry Hillman had found and John fell in love with Walter's work the style that Waldo was writing and this kind of staccato New York interrupted but you know was everything that John I've been talking about and I got a cable back from John saying you know hire Waldo salt and start working immediately it started as a very young man as a screenwriter and had a wonderful career and then he was blacklisted and it was a very big break for him he was well into his 50s and he'd had a really hard time this was like the phoenix rising out of the ashes in terms of a career for him to have this opportunity and he knew it John Schlesinger Waldo salt and Jerry Hellmuth work on the screenplay made the whole bunch of changes in editions and reinterpreted the book if you will we went to work together mostly out in Malibu in the house that John rented and that became more routine we'd meet in the morning we'd talk until we reached a point where we'd say Waldo write it he was a great believer in the notion that dialogue was the last thing to come into a scene that scenes were not about the dialogue that the difficult part of screenwriting had to do with finding the image and the action in the scene when I first approached Dustin I'd sent them the book of Midnight Cowboy because there was no script that was worth reading at that time and they read it and Dustin and affected yeah yes I want to play this all right when people would compliment me but the character I would say it's it's in the book you know that characters is so delineating in the book and he spent pages and pages describing Enrico Rizzo Mike Nichols called and wanted to test him for graduate they called me and said would this prevent him from doing a night cowboy we said absolutely not he went out he tested he was a huge success when he came back to us he was on his way to being a huge star graduates just huge been made Dustin an international star overnight the first place I met John Schlesinger in Times Square he'd seen a graduate and he didn't think I was right and I asked if I could meet him at horn & Hardart which was on 42nd Street about 3:00 in the morning and in fact I had audition for John by going dressing out present ratso and a so CD Coke and walking down 42nd Street with John going you know going into Nathan's or trying to get him to Sardis and being thrown out where's that joke Joe Buck where's that Joe [ __ ] yeah Joe book somebody gave me the book Midnight Cowboy said you should play the part every young actor in town knew this was the part of the decade it was a star-making part it was gonna go without me because I try to get in I could get in the door this and all this then and finally call my agent up I says Midnight Cowboy going again I said yeah I said what are they doing he says well they're screen testing I John they're pretty much down to what they want I said who's casting it I said Marian Doherty I said call Mary and tell her I'm coming into New York I'm leaving tonight she's the one who said to us finally look you're testing six other people for Christ's sakes test jon voigt adjustors words on i'll tell you what you're an interesting young man and we've already got three boys we're auditioning but you know why don't you put Waldo go off and read the script a little bit and if Waldo thinks it's appropriate you can come and be will audition you as well we put each actor in front of a white screen Waldo salt pretended to be a really nasty talk show host and there was no script they had to deal with this ex-marine is Lee my dad was off-screen going look at you nobody buys that dumb cowboy act anymore what do you stand there old you know he would insult him as the interviewer and and make Joe Buck kind of rise up and defend himself and talk about himself and it really revealed a Joe Buck that is in the movie what makes you think you got something that you can sell the women no that's what I got what yeah that's what I got on you I called Dustin and asked him to come up and look at the tests and he did and you know he hated being in that position and he said that he didn't want to be choosing between actors and all that but he understood the question and we asked him okay who's better and Dustin said look I don't know who's better or not but said what I found was that when the other actor was on the screen with me I was looking at myself when Jon Voight was on the screen with me I was looking at Jon Voight and I remember that so clearly and that was it there with Joe Buck Joe there's certain things that sparked me when I read it one is this humor I found him to be very humorous I was interested in The Adventures of Joe Buck what do you don't do Becky's a lot of rich women back there elf begging for it paying for two Jon Voight and I we traveled around Texas together out in Midland and Odessa I was very taken and something I really liked about the southern gentleman the aspect of yes or no sir I found that all these young people had that do you have another piece of gum for her oh yes I'm a Madhu there's a sweetness in it and that was Joe to message Joe has that sweetness he's got it from the culture he's not a coarse person even though he's involved in some raised bizarre stuff he's just a country boy you know and there was a self-consciousness about Joe bark that was immediately interesting to me the mirror images that you remember from the film came from the inner life of the character and his own inner insecurity every time we saw the mirror in which he could check himself and self-conscious himself against the surroundings and rehearse his actions you know what you got to do cowboy they were striving to be to belong somewhere that's what his journey was about and a family I know The Moorings but then is the suspense what's gonna happen to Joe easily just gave 20 here 20 there do the other guy he's got no sure oh man it's gonna be this is tough and then I'm just at the bottom in comes mr. Ezra there they are meeting at the bar Oh Joe Enrico Rizal from the Bronx I thought Dustin brought so much to the movie and I really think it's one of his four or five greatest performances I remember dusty came in and he had he had gone to this dentist who he can't forget the set of teeth and I was so jealous of Dusty's ugly teeth and his perfect limp I mean that limp was like the broken-winged bird you know like this little flip with his feet and stuff and I knew I had to find a proper walk for Joe to and we actually shot a couple of little pieces very early and I had to come up with it quick and there in the film those little pieces are in the film the image of the character to me was this man who I had the the limp that he had I in following him I remember it particularly as he actually stopped on 42nd Street to cross the street I think it's 7th Avenue and people crowd up at certain times of the day you know it was that kind of a day as I remember where people kind of crowd up and once the signal breaks to green there's kind of a grace a New York City race to get to the other side of the street and he won and I thought that was an indication of something I wanted to have in a character that ratso with his deformity would in spite of it come in first that was something about the character he was such a survivor we rehearsed Midnight Cowboy very much like a players rehearsed on the Graduate we had had three four weeks rehearsal and lo and behold we had the same thing on in that cowboy and I don't know if I've ever worked on any two films that had that kind of preparation delineating character work and you know and getting letting the director get a feel as to how he wanted to shoot it and bringing a cinematographer on this just the room that we had with marked off tape on the ground like you do when you're rehearsing a play the lines four steps and you know and that stuff and so much of the stuff that was discovered for Midnight Cowboy came from the room I remember one day I was reading somebody and all of a sudden I wasn't acting I had switch had been made I said oh there it is I got it dusted he'll do anything to find a character magnificent moments from my perspective came out of that pretending to fall downstairs just in a room where we didn't have any stairs where rats are falls down the stairs they did these unbelievably brilliant improv where they could just go on and on forever Walter was with us every step of the way and if they did an interesting proposition that lasted you know five minutes he cut it down to five lines but the essence of it was in the script Waldo salt the screenwriter sitting there I think it's a wall and sack tape-recorder no video cameras in those days and taping every improvisation that we did and John Schlesinger in treating us to do improvisation after analyzation after improvisation to to find the the the the the the real intimacy as actors how am I supposed to know that I mean you gotta tell a person each thing my masters [Music] the greatest pleasure for me very often was to go in and watch Joe and ratso play these scenes together they were both so completely clear about their characters and they both had I think magnificent sense of humor about their characters avoiding I loved improvising we never stopped we did it at lunchtime we worked the characters constantly because we just enjoyed it it was very exciting to us to try to said once we hit on what do these guys talk about and Schlessinger would sidle over and he'd start laughing because we were getting off and he just what is that and then he put it on film and there's a scene on fit on the screen it came out of him over hearing us at lunch where one of us says to the because it was just fun to try to figure the guys these guys out so if you were if you wouldn't reincarnated what would you come back as president I come back to the president maybe you kind of think about those things when I read the script who's the true characters but they they brought it to life in a way that was there was absolutely unique in the moment of putting my head I think which we found in rehearsal just resting and on on Voight's chest the audience knows they're seeing something that the characters are not consciously aware of they're seeing an intimacy that at its birth between these two guys how come you ain't scored once the whole time you've been in New York cuz I need management goddamnit you'd have to be brain-dead not to realize that you were seeing two superb actors just you know pushing each other higher and higher and higher and demanding more and more of each other we're doing everything we could within our techniques and within our imaginations and within every bone of our you know to get something real to happen between us to provoke real life and then suddenly there you are with the camera and the lights and everything and you're falling short you always do you're just never delivering what is what you want to deliver and we were able to use each other and and John would come up the weak sense very early on that we wanted if I'm gonna be better in this than you I'm gonna be better with you being your best that was implicit somehow and that that moves me to this moment and that will never leave us you know what you need you me my friend or Daniel he operates a bigger staple in pound I have to say John's lessons use I for casting this piece with people like John MacGyver and Vernon Hughes Bobby Balaban and his I was here's some special the casting director was Mary and Doherty and she knew where the good New York actors were hidden and she brought him in and we read everybody I'm brand spanking new nasarah 10 I was hoping to get a look at Statue of Liberty huh whoa when Sylvia miles came in and they were thinking of another actress very good actress who could have done a very good job with it but it was very real well-known here's a person that no one would ever have seen before and I like the idea of the of the audience seeing these people as real people when I went and read for that part with Jon Voight I tell you I was gonna get that part epic killed me and she gave that reading and I we went you know I was it oh boy this is that we gotta get her she's she's a hot one boy she brings it to the table she's not afraid of anything he was a perfect dupe you know but he had that kind of confidence see so he's got there and does his little charm things he and this like in it he takes the bait know the hook you know and then simply the way Sylvia did it of course was so it was immediately so interesting and so somehow authentic they did not do this part and I didn't think it was necessary to be liked to be admired to be liked it was had a function in a crazy way he's just a soft hearted guy Joey's a sweetheart and he feels bass is this funny thing you asked for money as I was about to ask you for some money and there's that beautiful moment he says here you here you want some money you just can't stand to see a girl cry a few boys here you what you want 110 she takes it 20 20 there you go girl there's slap on the butt he tries to make it out with his dignity I mean is so beautiful so many layers to it aren't there he has to be taken by her she has to take him she got the money she out hustled the hustler [Music] John MacGyver played this wacky evangelist in this tenement in a you know this apartment building and it was a crazy scene and a great scene so much in that scene commentary and stuff but the real heart of it is the energy between these two guys Barnard Hughes was another magnificent man I'm Townsend feedlot from Chicago call me Tony I'm here on a paper manufacturer's convention and thankfully they have a little fun damn and Burnett Hughes remember we were doing a scene where I turn on him because of desperate and that's exactly what he wants me to do some sick part of him and I hit him and he had false teeth and and he I don't know what John suggested he suggested maybe if he hits me I'd lose my teeth why so that's such a it's that kind of the non vanity of the real artist it doesn't care what he looks like he's trying to do this role make it grotesque and it was so beautifully done No look at this here see there's an e and money I mean if that's your word I think Brenda sly and funny and wicked and sexy hey joints lessons I saw her on Broadway and I know for certain that married Dorothy was involved in that to New York in 1960s was just booming in terms of influences in terms of breaking down the barriers social cultural and I cannot tell you how much I enjoyed watching it and really soaking it in John had always had a fascination with America but this is his first big stay and he fell in love with it I've really absurdities in the excesses being an outsider as John was and as I was that we have a certain observation about America that an American would just see something strange happened and won't think anything about it because it was new to John he saw things that the rest of us simply didn't see I mean I was born and raised in New York I was so used to people falling down or people fighting in doorways or but it didn't register for me every single thing registered for John he sought and he was at my contest purposes insanity this has to be John Schlesinger and Adam Hollander had a very specific vision of what the movie should look like this grittiness of New York streets and a very contemporary look for that time the major goal was to find the way to portray the innocence of Joe Buck character so on one hand it had to look real on the other hand we're trying to like him in a way that would sort of accentuate his innocence John is a tow fellow so all you had to do is to throw him on Fifth Avenue and 52nd Street put a 1200 millimeter lens three blocks away and have him walk through the crowd and he would always pop up from the crowd we had actually gone down to a site of where some buildings were being demolished and down in the lower village on the east side and John had originally wanted to film the X flat on that location but there was no water there was no power there were no toilets it was rat infested it would have been a disaster our designer John Robert Lloyd it was also brilliant he said look leave it to me I can give you this in the studio and you know we said oh you can never get the realism in the studio he said trust me he got permission from the city and he tore this apartment out and he brought it all to the studio you walked into that set with the grimy shades with the X's on them and the filth on the windows and the stink of urine boy he got in there and you thought you were down in this tournament he did absolutely brilliantly it was a large part of the concept of grimy cold and pleasant life of rats are written on the streets of New York as opposed to imaginary sequences if they score and get themselves to Florida and those two looks played against each other and the basic idea was to photograph scenes in New York in a underexpose called bluish grayish tones and imaginary sequences in Florida for example whoever exposed almost two stops intercut those two looks I think works well for the scenes it's Sun oranges juice its health its I will be healthy one of my jobs that John Schlesinger and Jerry Hillman gave me was to you know bring back all the war hogs Superstars and freaks and anybody I could round up to be in that great party sequence we ended up on a stage in a set that was almost exactly the replica of war host studio war Hope has participated in dressing in loaned us a lot of his art and a lot of his friends that party sequence was was literally a party that went on I think for about one or two weeks the camera crew suddenly said I think we're really just a documentary crew and they just went around shooting everybody [Music] [Applause] flashbacks were a big deal with this film how do we include this much information how do we get people to the table so that they know who Joe is so they can respond with him through the different circumstances how do we set to set the story and they went and shot all these little pieces to establish this background that was all absolutely planned from the start the backstory on Joe Buck was that he was a kid who was kicked from pillar to post his mother went off to work in a war factory and he went to live with Grandma Sally buck you could just feel everything about Joe Buck from those few moments she had a series of men in her life mostly Cowboys who were gentleman callers the cowboy images of sex and and romance all being tied up with the idea of boots and saddles so this was a profound influence on this guy who connected masculinity sexuality with Cowboys Annie was the first person that made gelbach feel like he was a lover he was too dumb to know that you don't kiss the town [ __ ] you know all the other guys would take her behind the movie screen and have their way with her but he was fool enough to kiss her women go crazy woman that's a really true fact rats oh hell crazy Annie they're sent away and her feeling for him imbued him with his own power so that it it's what gave him the sense that he was somebody here the on you Joe you're the only one that meant something to him beyond what it would have meant to a more sophisticated or a more healthy soul [Music] they wanted a almost subliminal feeling about what went on without showing you we as black and white film will mix it with color within New York Street as well and subways and I think he gave the overall look of the film on another dimension if you didn't bring your brains to the party you wouldn't know what was going on just be a lot of images and flashlights Samoa it has a very unconventional first two or three reels until he meets ratso and in the narrative kind of you know the the progressive narrative kicks off up until then it's back and forth back and forth and and I don't know if an audience's that they're so programmed today for linear it's almost simplistic storytelling unfortunately that I you know I think was much more sophisticated than than most films today [Music]

Channel: Filmingmentary

Views: 157,977

Keywords: Midnight Cowboy movie, documentary, interview, Michael Childers, Jerome Hellman, Jennifer Salt, Dustin Hoffman, Jon Voight, John Barry, Sylvia Miles, Bob Balaban, Adam Holender

Id: 5GqQfVINcqo

Length: 29min 59sec (1799 seconds)

Published: Tue May 12 2020