Alan Alda's surprising attitude to Parkinson's diagnosis

welcome back well a very special moment on The Today Show as we talked to one of the world's most beloved actors a man with a super impressive body of work on screens big and small including his signature role as Hawkeye pious in the long-running hit television series mash very dry martini a very dry arid barren desiccated veritable Dust Bowl of a martini woodwork Igor very good in the morning he would be one of my guides either nervous it's the first time I saw you I remember Eddie don't take two aspirin and go to bed they don't have any respect well we can skip the first part know what a show it was with an incredible six Emmys six Golden Globes to his credit I am delighted to say actor director writer comedian and a whole lot more Alan Alda is with us live from New York City thank you for joining us sir we do appreciate it do you miss Hawkeye no I because he's mainly fictional so I miss real people but we have this we have this little delay so when you said that I had an impressive body of work I thought you were just going to stop after impressive body but no I well its bits all of the above look mash ranks is one of the most popular television shows of all time the final episode of course the most-watched TV broadcast in US history for many many years why do you think so many people connected with that show sir I think the the reason that is not thought about often is that we were dealing with something that really happened to real people and although we were silly often when we were doing surgery on people who had been mangled in a horrible situation of war we took that seriously and I think people responded to the the reality of it to the humanity of it yeah I think you're a hundred percent correct there it was also funny as heck but Hauk I made you a household name of course one of the most loved actors of your generation what was it like to deal with such extreme success it was hired at first as a matter of fact I wasn't used to it even though my father had been a very famous actor in the 40s and I grew up seeing Fame I didn't know what it was like to experience it yourself it's not that easy you must go through it you're famous on the other side of the world oh yeah it sometimes it's hard to get used to yeah don't you have people tearing at your clothes well no it's better you must be very proud of everything you've achieved and of course your many other roles 30 rock The West Wing you know the movies Leo and the aviator got you nominated for a lot of stuff what's more important to you sir critical acclaim box-office success or being revered as as just a lovely man none of those doing good work and doing accomplishing something that I find hard to do but I'm able to make it work like this new podcast I started I had no idea that it was going to be a success I just wanted the pleasure of bringing something of value to the Internet and we buy tomorrow at about noon we'll have about a half a million downloads of this podcast series called clear and vivid and it just makes me so happy that it's working well it's a huge success and it I guess it gives you the freedom doesn't it it's just you one-on-one you know talking to to your fans people who want to listen no no it's actually me talking in very interesting conversations about relating and communicating to other people something that seems to be really something that we're all hungry for is how to talk to people that are more difficult to speak with something for instance but these conversations are with very interesting guests the first first person I talked to on the series is was Sarah Silverman who who is a comedian but devoted now to trying to communicate with people who don't agree with her sometimes hater and she has some really moving stories to tell about that so the show is funny sometimes moving at others but I think always interesting because we're trying to find out how to communicate better with one another it's it's a must listen podcast before we go I must must say to you that the whole world was of course saddened when you revealed your diagnosis with with Parkinson's I just want to ask you how you're doing and I note from your from your tweets that you do boxing every week and you play tennis so how are you doing I am doing great and I hope the world's not saddened about it because the whole idea of talking about it was to try to help people lose the stigma you know it's hard to keep a secret and if you're especially if your hands shake or you have some other symptom it's much more easy to live your life if you just frankly say yeah I got Parkinson's I'm working on it and I'm working on it and I'm doing very well boxing three times a week tennis twice a week singles I juggle I March to John Philip Sousa music which is supposed to be good for Parkinson's it's it's it's something that you can cope with and now and I and I encourage everybody to keep moving if you get a diagnosis and start moving as soon as you can very good indeed so that is a wonderful advice congratulations on clear and vivid we it's it's it's a fantastic podcast we love following you on Twitter we appreciate your time today so we wish you well Alan Alda thank you very much indeed sir thank you bye-bye good day today to you too what a lovely lovely man we loved we loved information we loved him for so many roles if you haven't seen it look up a beautiful little gentle film called same next year he is just gorgeous in it yeah a man of great humility isn't it who is just so committed to doing good work richly great fun of your work Thank You Dickie

Channel: TODAY

Views: 2,414

Rating: 5 out of 5

Keywords: TODAY, Karl Stefanovic, Georgie Gardner, Australia, News, Karl, Aussie, Sylvia Jeffreys, Lisa Wilkinson, Richard Wilkins, Tim Gilbert, Natalia Cooper, Deborah Knight, alan alda, mash, alzheimers, podcast, M*A*S*H*, M*A*S*H, parkinsons

Id: tLwJNOq73pg

Length: 6min 59sec (419 seconds)

Published: Thu Aug 09 2018