Award Season Roundtable Series: The Actors Uncensored 2011

they're one thing in scripts when you read them that will make you stop stop doing that up now what makes about reading stop reading us is it passed it's pretty it is pretty much but four or five you got to get you yeah the wait yes it's if it's in the trash I would say the first speech that's over like two sentences where you actually have to see writing if those start to sound false then it never goes yeah or because if it's one word or two hey hi you can't tell you write also string of you together any content don't you haven't have also going right through to the end to make sure you're in the last scene the computer the computer tells your now you're just looking for the secret but compared there now now there now the computer tells you you just said what what part you're playing Larry the computer says you're on six pages so oh Jesus okay back to just read Larry is there any role you would not play Larry well this book this book has just come out Rin Tin Tin I don't know yeah one for him that it must have been maybe 10 15 years ago someone approached me to play now I'm going to forget his name the the the Polanski the baby brother of the what's his name um the killer Weldon understand thanks Joan off yeah Jeff Charles mattress okay well I wasn't no you wouldn't what it wasn't interested do I not know I just think just out I think I just felt out of respect to the the family and it was just just I'm just not interested student there's too much karma around that yeah is way too heavy you know these things the facts there was an American kind of iconic antihero kind of thing that chuck was trying to appeal to cuz we just got off the top of my trucks and that same thing he did so they used to stop me a lot but he called him Chuck you know and he spoke Manson yeah Chuck he's stubborn I think his friends that was the name of the script wasn't just like no no dad cut the top of my truck off cuz I rolled it over so they had a giant cheapest and then stopped me insane are you related to Chuck and I always played the fifth you know I just let on the crown do you think you got stopped for a lot of things I never knew about that probably noticed Chuck like where the Karma has stayed with you Christopher and impacted you and haunted you you thinking there yes that haunts you enough yeah literally the first part alright but the second one sees on the heat becomes an entirely other play it's a play about Gloucester and Edmund you're sitting in your dressing room getting stoned waiting to come on again then you come on finally in the audience said hey that looks like kingly forgotten all about it's not the Magisterial piece saying is not the second act the toughest role you've had to play Helen of Troy no I think the part in The Sound of Music was the toughest one why because it was so awful and sentimental and gooey and you had to work terribly hard to try and infuse some in this fuel bit of humor into it he didn't believe everything you so shut up Alex actually that's a survivor isn't it territory I was escaping from yachts and of course we saw that police it's become an iconic film do you perceive it now where do you think people think you wrong no it's a very good picture of what it is and I'm bad but somebody had to be Peck's bad boy and I chose myself do you with making the shift from stage to film difficult for you no not really I as a young actor on the screen I was very bad and thought of when one was always thinking of how you look when you're young you know you your own conscious of the profiler so conceited and that's all I thought about I thought that was all the movies we work about and I was quite young and it wasn't until I hit the drunk stage of my life in the 40s suddenly had fun on film during character roles that's the key yeah what was the first film you had fun with John Huston's the man who would be king that was terrific drunk through the whole thing weighing what is acting fun poor John Huston was you know i emphysema very badly by that time but in such a marvelous care he had a oxygen tent on the set he used to go in but he always took his cigar with that always worked explosion probably directs a lot easier than he could breathe to if acting farmers at hard work no I cut tobacco for a living in Kentucky that was hard work did you really yeah I sold insurance door-to-door that's hard work acting is not hard work acting is you know if you're lucky enough to be sitting at a table like this you've been very lucky in your life you caught the brass ring somewhere along the way I've known a tremendous amount of talented actors who didn't get opportunities so luck is or has always been a huge part of what it is we do so I always considered myself and people my friends who work to have an element of luck along the way and so is it hard work certainly there's it's long hours nobody wants to hear you complain I mean I remember I was selling women's shoes at a department store which is a lousy job it sounds like it'd be great but it's just you know it it wasn't like elegant shoes it was you know eighty year old women like that's a hammertoe you know and you're like no I don't want to see that and III remember thinking people would I would hear of famous stars complaining in Hollywood about how hard their life was and I thought you know I didn't want to hear that so I don't find it I don't find it difficult I find it challenging and sometimes I'm very bad at it but I don't find it necessarily hard do you think you were bad and have become better I think Scripps make people better like directions direction makes people better you know you can find a lot of projects where actors were tremendously good in one project and you'll see them not work if necessarily well in others and X Crips make a huge difference in that department can the editing creative performance and you've directed and edit yes editing can absolutely help help a performance by eliminating a tap expand that's right well you know it wasn't it Mercedes McCambridge or giant or something she the edited lien scene and played it all on her she didn't have a word to say and she wanted to gather be it was in network right was it network no I thought it was John yeah maybe but was straight and Regis right right yes how did you end up cutting tobacco I grew up in Kentucky that was what you did in summers I mean that's how you made your living three bucks an hour but you know that's what everybody did feel that's how did you know then you want to act I figured it out right after I finished cutting my uncle was an actor name was a furrier and he'd come to Kentucky I'd never met him and he came to Kentucky to do a movie when I was 20 years old with his son Miguel Ferrer and also a wonderful actor and I didn't really know either of them very well he knew Miguel a little bit and I was very enchanting with the idea of Hollywood because I'd grown up and serve a small town in Kentucky game and I went and I was an extra for about two months on the on the set they got me a gig and then Jose said yeah I go to Holly wouldn't be an actor I said okay you know and then I got lucky but the thing is you know if you're in a whole life of an actor if you go through periods where you're not working that would be the hard part you know having the job and having something to do that's the good part but you know for a whole career everybody goes through ups and downs so when you go through years and you're not getting anything it becomes difficult like it would in any job when you're not getting anything what's the longest you've gone without working well I'm I'm not a good person to ask because I've run it a extraordinarily slow pace my whole life because I've made my own films you know each one of those takes three years so so you know yeah I I don't know I mean I've always been working I've always been writing so but I've had no checks for two and a half years you know writing on spec trying to get a movie financed nothing coming in for Nick you will you did big Hollywood films and at some point you chose to walk away from that why well it was obvious I wasn't going to get any more roles you know I can see it coming um I just got uncomfortable with the budgets you know it started out 10 15 min was a big budget than 20 30 min and then 40 min and 50 min and I started getting up there that existed feel comfortable and the scripts weren't getting any better in fact the the beer the the budget the worse the script it seemed to follow hand-in-hand and is the better work was in the independence while the independents were still operating you know we could raise money like ten million dollars pretty easy for independence and and then do whatever you want I when I was working with Paul Schrader he had a momentary outrage with that we were in the bar across the street from where we were shooting in another bar and we had a glass of wine and shredder was going boy I want to do one of those hundred million dollar films I you know I'm not really doing my work unless I do honor me and dollar paralyzed it Paul you know you just full of it I mean here you've got you you got to pick the scrip you got to pick your cast you got to pick everything all down the line you'll never have it more control than you have right here and you want to get in one of those nightmares hundred-million-dollar collaborative effort of decision me not by you you know and not by the drought so certainly you know so it just it looked like it was going to get more nightmarish you know he was hoping Pixar would make taxi driver was that what was it a gradual decision Russell was the one film you did we thought this is it I want to change well you know I am very fortunate was able to do some films that I suggested you know like 48 out north 40 I actually didn't want to do 48 hours they kept saying the black check wasn't funny so yeah to this date cats burgers trade-off I'll blurt out who it was I won't have argument Christmas bonus it was the worst have been every low moment anyone that's kind of daily green yeah what I don't know I live with a death lately cuz I'm 70 you know and after you after 70 you know you don't think about sex much anymore do you think about which is Haiti I knew you I was waiting okay you didn't died and what do you think about dumb don't go into it leave it leave it as a surprise yeah you know does getting older change you'll protect the rules you choose or the work you want to do am illiterate or you know it's I five I'm working more than I've ever worked in my life let me it's unbelievable I don't know what's something either there's only me left in the 80s but I think because some other people must be really when I whacked but I don't know I'm having an absolute ball I really am and I've never been happier that's the course that's the best thing I read about two years thank you Chris straight you found successful I mean global success Rosalie legs relatively with what things call for you before max get not always better it was wrong the same story that that's that's not a specifically American story that's in all in all the cultures that I know the actor has ups and downs that's the nature of the beast so I have ups and downs on the smaller level and they were ups and downs and ups and downs and they obviously the Downs must have been I mean you're a bit up a lot well that but but consistently you can I mean especially in the german-speaking area you can you know be a member of a theater company and do that for time now my grandparents did it in one theater for their whole careers you didn't work several films at time too I shot that one in Jefferson Parish I mean they'd get out of their clothes and then they'd go down in Italy pick up the film they were doing Italy compact Paris pickup yeah exactly yeah so it's it's possibly more secure and more consistent but if you're not really buying into that consistency because of the certain degree of consistency brings a certain degree of mediocrity then you know you expose yourself to the ups and downs but still you know the social social backup is you know from from the very system is is far more secure so I'm being unemployed for nine months is not a life-threatening experience one thing I remember two years ago you did around pastors you in city looking forward to the opportunities that were coming from success of a film now two years later having done some more global more Americanized films how had those roles changed you and how do you how are you finding working in a different system like that well that's one thing that I said to one of my colleagues and before we started inglorious basterds in Berlin Sylvester grow to played doubles in in the movie and he's about my age and you're standing there in front of the in front of the studio and we both said what here we are and then we both said yep but we're not gonna doing much different than we have for the past 30 years so yeah how has it changed yeah it maybe you know made life certainly more exciting and certain parts more enjoyable and more interesting but that's what we're where success late in a career comes in very handy because you see it's great it's lovely I joined but it was about being a star well I think I tell me what Christoph is talking about there's an interesting thing when you know for me it was relatively later I've been on so many failed television series for such a long time um my aunt was a really talented singer you know Rosemary Clooney in 1950 she was on the cover of every magazine she was a big hit and then rock and roll came in and women singers nine of the top ten singers were women then we're all gone and he was all he became a male dominant dominated and she was gone and she was on the road and people start saying what happened he where'd you go and and she's like I'm here I'm singing I'm doing like and what the are you talking about and she was gone for 20 years and it because she was so young she was 19 when it first happened she sort of believed all that that you would believe if you're 19 where people tell you how brilliant you are and how good you are all those things so that meant now she's clearly wasn't when of course she didn't become less of a singer along the way the things change the elements change so you know later on she came back she gunned believably great sort of Renaissance of a career and I never thought she little ages ya know she did you know she was one left we are the greats but but she was gone for 20 years she could get a job I mean I mean literally quit Bing Crosby gave her a job 20 years later and she had she never saw issues you know prescriptions reversing right yeah basically and so suddenly you know for me that was always the understanding later in life getting success after I'd failed so many times you have a much easier understanding of how you know at the end of the day you're all in a different couch and it's Ralph Edwards doing this is your life and you're sitting here like this and you're like you know everything was going great and then tragedy struck and you're like you know and we understand that a little bit better and I think that's the great thing about those kids what you were talking about I think is really important is that this is a journey that we all get to go on and it's not it doesn't it's not a constant move like this it's a cuts and it's how you handle this spirit the down part and it's much better to happen are you afraid of the devil are you afraid of fate it I think you know everything all those are afraid of failure of UHN of course I don't think the downside is but right the downside is about not working you know you can't find work you know that and that's pretty spooky ah I mean you know I I reach out and not I do it your Europe in film one year you know what I just did one in Spain but I was the only person that could speak English service could only speak Spanish there was something wrong with him it was because I can't remember who was all interviewed recognize the people I mean I did but it was a it was great experience now if I had stayed home when the work then I would have been in the but you know me but the truth is you know without turning this into a men's group it isn't it well I know but I'm talking oh is it not not no go no no no sir it was only once and I was drawing was doing we're don't stop you know you are who you are no matter what happens to you and when when you go to sleep at night that's your brain is the star thing then not a star thing that they touch it means nothing to you to your soul your soul doesn't go oh you're a star you know all that stuff that that was buried deep is gone so so the thing is I I think my father was a radio a famous radio comedian and he was very ill and he died when I was young and I think before I really comprehended anything I saw that this stuff had no meaning he was paralyzed you know he didn't care about people going oh I love your radio show he could barely get out of a chair and so you know and famous people would come to the house and you'd have an instinct like would you want to spend two weeks with Milton Berle and a on a boat I don't know that you would you know so I I just I think it's something that doesn't people think that exterior success changes but your demons are your demons and they're only sort of magnified so I mean you know the person who I would admire clears that stuff up and then if they're in a hit movie good for them you know that's that's all have you had any great role model any here any person who's really influenced you you could say other than to listen I I I loved and I loved jak Benny most of anybody and and Jack Benny did something when I was very young that showed that showed me more about how to live a life in this business I was on a Tonight Show early on in my career and I did this bit I even remembered it was a baritone as elephant bimbo it was a European elephant trainer and the elephant didn't make it they were in Chicago the night before so we had to do the show and he did it with a live frog beating him like an elephant and throwing him peanuts and and and Jack Benny was on and when they went away for the last break Jack Benny leaned over to Johnny Carson and said when we come back ask me where I'm going to where I'm going to be performing with you and you know Johnny Carson sure so they came back they were saying goodnight Johnny said to Jack Jack where are you going to be performing and Jack said never mind about me that's the funniest kid I've ever seen and I thought you know it's like look what he did he set that up to make a compliment it was you know oh so you can be brilliant and gracious they go together and that's fantastic so I loved who most influenced you growing up in England my father really because my mother brought me up they're just so I she's a hero of mine really because but she's 92 still gets around she lives here I moved her out and so you know life Arthur 84 my mom is and and you know what and still takes the bus and will call me from the end of it you know I said I'll come and pick you up but but she's very still very luckily she's independent I've never heard my mother say poor me right this way doesn't wanna change but not every day oh yeah I'm at the bus station uh King used to do the big tapestries and and then and then was it and then was a you know met my father Inlet in the Royal Navy in the war and became you know a housewife and and then when I was about six or seven he ran off with his best friend's wife it happens and and so she a my I have all the sisters who had flown the coop so I was essentially an only child and but thankfully she was a she's a great very lucky to have a mom 92 yeah my last mile 86 and that was the last parent yeah problem with that is that when that last parent dies you call your sister or your brother if you had one and you say how old are you in whichever ones your oldest that's the next one that goes you know but it's not going to work out that way I don't think my sister's two years older than me and I think what you're getting the most call yeah so where did you decide you good at I saw probably a movie now that one could stand the test of time a film by Brian Falls gosh yeah called the raging moon and with Malcolm McDowell a young a very young now and it was like um I think you know those sort of a moment of what alcoholics talk about that at the moment of clarity or the you know it was it was it was like I want to do that I'd never I'd never been in school plays or why would I would mimic as a kid and and I guess I had party peace you know but but had never never was him in the never never in in plays at school and I just saw this thing one night when I want to do that hungry for 15 really that's really what yeah what was it why do you want what appeal to you it was it was just his there was a sort of that there's a sort of mixed I mean now I can in hindsight i guess it was a sort of was this incredible he had a mixture of it was sort of vulnerability and Menace there was just this it about him and I and just sort of been announced you know I'm going to be an active her instead of you know instead of a criminal but she's an option next specially it was did did you know Michael McDowell before I mean of him having seen movies with him before that was the first thing I believe but then I saw if clockwork re-written and then sort of but that was the first thing I'd say then have you heard about him read about him or no nothing because I'm one of what I'm interested in is whether it was the the celebrity that you found attracted that track does this character he was he was a it is a bit of a lad bit of a womanizer bit of a drinker and he's a the opening of the movie is in play he's playing soccer and he becomes paralyzed and and has to go into a sort of like a code with being in a wheelchair and it was just this minute yeah just this counter I was just draw drawn to their what don't you character before that what have you thought you might do well I wanted to be a cameraman and I we had a thing at school which did you have something here like a careers officer they used to call them the careers officer guidance counselor guiding guidance see that's what about me and I went and I went and said that I've had to be a cameraman and they looked at me like I was get us another planet I mean it is it's it's funny I mean I I got I guess my my break came with a movie break came with Sid Nancy but I had been from 10 9 10 years you know before that a good seven years in the theater and I've been acting now thirteen thirty-one years and you were talking earlier about careers you know it's I mean I'm I'm 53 and I'm sitting here it's the first time I've sat here and I'm loving every minute your mom you do I know up to Fairfax I go home through perfect right here with you did you you know I did I did right why you know driving layup that yeah I did I did the play at Steppenwolf vicious which Alex Cox came to see when and was working on when they were doing Sidley Aunty and the got John Schneider who played I think your agent in the movie was a guy who'd played Sid and looks like plenty play yeah yeah yes I believe a teacher is an active yeah wait Rose Bruford three years it's all the usual did it make a difference yeah yeah what do you the rescue create to journey a discipline yeah it does does the training help yes it does well what training did you have a choice between creative of course I have because the theater is what it's to me what it's what it's all about and and you you get trained just by doing it the audience tells you how good you are and they laugh that they think it's funny and if they don't you you'll burn very quickly that is very embarrassing if they that is your partner but the audience it's your partner but even if you're playing to a very beautiful girl you still are whoring a little bit because the audience is the important part and that's extraordinary training so I try to get back as much as I can to something very good but why not try this with it unfortunately there isn't that in the United States we don't have that kind of tradition the thing we have that has the repertory companies that you can go into and the kind of training you have to kind of seek it out on your own there is a lot of theater in the United but you you have to go find it using two universities but you can go out and have your own little circuit I had a circuit that read the little fear of the Rockies in really Colorado which I was a guest artist and then a stock equity company called the old log Theatre in Excelsior Minnesota and then the AH actors in a circle in Phoenix Arizona then there was a couple of companies in San Francisco and you just run a circuit you know he'd add to that and take from that and if you owned in New York I'd never go to New York except to audit classes because I did not want to get stuck in classes and I just didn't see the benefit what's the best advice or the worth if I thumbies given you best devices to do theater do the roles you need to do when you need to do them and pursue that no matter what the arena and then you know if you gotta go to one of these places like New York in LA for God's sake get an invitation you know it's much easier going track that's one interesting thing that happens now when you when you work with younger actors because you know even in LA there was actually a very lively theater you know it was all equity waiver or you go down Melrose there was 15 theaters going on you could go from theater work computer theater and you you some of it was really bad theater but you got a lesson in sort of taking a character from the beginning to the end in an hour and a half or two hours in the two or three act play and sometimes when you work with younger actors now who haven't done theater because most of them haven't now they've gotten famous quickly when you talk to them they'll go well they'll try to like when you're directing and they will try to win every scene every single scene in there and they'll try to win and you go you have to lose some seeds because you're going to win an end and in order to get that and that through lines sometimes a very interesting thing because you have to say if you've done the theatre you'd go well no I'm not I'm not gonna cry in these first next two scenes because I'm gonna really lay it on at the end and get you and have earned it and it's an interesting thing watching the actual benefits of what you all are talking about which is that theatre you know people love to say oh you did a theatre and you know what you were that's that's that you want to talk about but there really is a there it is beneficial in film acting as well it makes a difference in the way you work all absolutely I mean I can't imagine how how one understands whether something is really funny what the timing of it is without an audience that's what you learn from the audience we learn what was directing change to acting as directed change your acting well um I I started as an actor before I came a director but you know I I went to Carnegie Tech which was only Fiat which was a theatre school and it was an amazing opportunity because you were taking mime with this man Jule Walker and dance with Paul Draper and you you know you did everything and they mine okay and and then I went and I did two years of summer stock and it's a Priscilla Beach theatre and you did you know sixteen parts right and and that's and anything that you who helps you as an actor anything a trip you take to Spain will help you as an actor any experience but especially physical you know stretching your body and and and doing something that well I'm never going to spend but somehow you you know you use it so I work as a director I work with actors from an actor's point of view so I I'm more concerned with how you know that communications doing I think that I'm communicating with the cinematographer I have to hope the cinematographers doing the right job I'm more concerned if you're in the scene how you're doing and and that's I think there are some directors who like the picture more than the person but I I'm going to the experience of directing for both of you just impacted the way you go you go about acting your board you are more direct you are you you are you simplify a lot of the things you get quicker to the answer as an actor a lot because you'll understand you know a lot of times is this weird dance that directors and actors have to play you know the director is basically trying to manipulate the actor into doing what he wants what he is seeing the picture to be yes but right but then the actor but you want to the actor likes to think that it was his idea right so it's something so not that's what means to assess manipulation because the actor then is trying to manipulate the director into doing what he always thought and there's this when you're not you're not when you're acting only you're not directing no you're not but you are all actors have a some idea of what the scene is going to be that is always never going to be quite what the director thinks in general right and you're going to go and I've worked with you I've seen you I see what you do yeah however it is very but actors will you work with each other we work together and others they'll be like well maybe if I did this and the director sort of wouldn't want us to do those things like Soderbergh and I we did a scene together with Ducey together with Steven Soderbergh and we have ideas and Steven really didn't want us to do those things right because we asked him to stay out of the room when the camera it's very insulting he was in Sofia you see myself you go home you come out it will be so great there's always this sort of game you know and part of it is this this little dance you do and sometimes being an actor and having been an actor and then directing there is some understanding of a shortcut where I'll go I know what you want and how about we just go and you could find a shorter version of that then having to do the dance that director it's just only director and actor to a lot of times not I've read this really interesting article yesterday written by a psychologist the cognitive by behavioral psychologist Daniel Kahneman and he puts this thing down to the illusion of validity he calls it I read everybody everybody you know it's so convinced about the the validity of their of their approach of their actions of their and they're confident opinion and be so confident about that decisions it's a complete illusion so I mean it's really more or less confidence of communicating your point then being right or wrong you confident January or does your confidence change with success yes it has I don't know exactly how and I don't know exactly on what level it has changed because I have felt for a long time something that everybody experiences a certain certain degree of being misplaced because I always had the feeling yeah well you know it's all right what I'm doing and I know why I'm doing it illusion of validity but but nobody seems to really want it enough or not enough people want it for me to make headway and so success actually in in a way push that illusion of validity into a slightly different and more satisfying direction but you like your work really I don't see it you do not not regularly you know certain things I avoid and certain things I can't go back and see old things you've done no never never never do you - you - no I think it's healthy sometimes you know and I said someone said you know what do you think about you know then all the flows inflamed and I know I'm very at little II sort of said oh well I just stamp most of it to the ground but I don't mean that in a don't mean that in a disrespectful way it's just just it's it's old work some of its good some of it stinks and and you know what does tomorrow bring no I can't see for what makes the great actor try asking me Beth well I'd be telling them that makes a great actor but not a good actor great actor good well I think my experience of watching rejecting it's always been someone who has who has the great rage I think the great rage is the one that shakes them to their boots and if you're capable of that and I think I've seen a few actors who have done that well actually mr. Oldman it wasn't me like the great rage you do the great rage the great temper someone who can lose their temper suddenly very quickly and frighten the not just out of the person he's playing with but the audience as well it's the rage and then and then the the ability to to make the classic roles seem so modern I'm so fresh that that's the yeah yeah no I don't know what I would come to that defuse to to do I breathe it that you have to greater age does after you you ex-wives 15 minutes people we started even yelling at such an interesting that poisonous what is selecting I'm not just because we're here but but but mister clean here can give you we can give you Michael Clayton mmm-hmm and then you can do a brother we're out there hmm let's I think you know that's that's that's a you know you're great actor that's range that isn't right afraid George to agree with with Christopher I well I liked what he said because there is a there's an element of that that you'll see even in comedy you'll see that kind of rage it doesn't have to be angry you know it has to be you know watch Joel McCrea in you know in Sullivan's Travels and there is still this throbbing undercurrent that's always going around I think that there's some real truth of what he said and I think that's what's fun about see how much that I think I just certainly see mister no t I think it's running out I think I think it's an additional thing also especially in movies because in theater it's it's different but in movies because you're large and the camera is close to you and I can't describe it perfectly but the actors that have always been the most affecting to me are the ones that allow me to interpret on my own and there are some actors that give you a hundred percent they don't let you get in they're all they're working you see them working and there are other actors that instinctively lay back and it's really like a you know I mean why should why should any modern artist sell for hundreds of millions of dollars it's only because people are standing there and they're thinking of what what what does this mean to them and the same thing happens with a with a good actor and that's that they allow you to fill in the blanks and I don't I wouldn't know how to teach somebody that but I think you know you take someone like Spencer Tracy who just did it he just woke up and he did it and even Jimmy Stewart I'm just thinking of older great actors yes what what the blanks of what fill in the blanks of what the blanks of the rest of your character that you're that you're not responsible that's exactly what when I'm driving up because that's one thing that I meant to ask you before when you were fascinated by the character what what what was it you had to let his imagination go it had to it had to be something that he did that you took and extended so yeah yeah to put yourself as the spectator into the story or to say that's my uncle or do you know to be able to take it that enth degree that you can't do you can fill in the character 90% but there but you know if you lay back and I allow you to say Jesus he reminds me of my brother instead of being so you know I'm so this that there's no interpretation left they're repeated good scenes will do that what's a good singer oh you listen to it you say to Rosemary she was 70 years old and I said you can't hit any of the notes you use the hit you can't hold eating in the notes you used to hold why are you a better singer she goes I don't have to prove I can sing anymore it's I just serve the material and then and let the work let them may be good material let's hope everybody else is good and let everybody else sort of participate you know totally because I think you know great actor great actors are Oh their greatness a lot to the parts that they play don't you talk about some fundamental mystery people have on the screen you notice that's something you can create by choice well it was just on the way this industry I mean you've got two people on the screen and you want to watch that person more than you want to watch the other one that you can't explain right if there's any mystery and I know people wets lyrical about acting in my third eye and I talk about all this they talk about such rubbish about acting but if there's any mystique to it its Talent it's harder to keep that ally in the modern world of show business where you have to go front and center and sell everything you do and there's less mystery there's no mystery but you know you can still have it as a person I mean I you know there's people who know me very well but they're not a hundred percent sure what I'm thinking when I'm looking at them so you know I can talk to them all day long there's so much sure so that's that's that's in me but it the mist you know to me movies would all be better if nobody ever saw the actors ever except on the screen it would be way better it would just make them all more fascinating I don't want to see everybody on David Letterman and then go see the movie but you know that's the world we're able what's the most you say about all the rubbish people said about acting what's the most interesting things somebody said about hacking oh I have to say I saw what you just said was really interesting about the rage but what's the most interesting things somebody said about acting the most fierce why Arthur I personally have ever heard it heard it put I think it was um and I don't read any of his stuff but Meisner the acting and who said yeah but he said that acting was it was living under imaginary circumstances I thought that was for me I connected to them so it's a bit a very eloquent very simple direct way of putting it so then you view living truthfully living trust very that's a totally different thing yeah living truthfully under imaginary circumstances I mean I've never met anyone who actually becomes the character I've never met him it I made it look claimed yeah except I didn't you sure you don't want to take the Chuck Manson do you feel that you wonder if attacking is meaningful if it's if it's a worthwhile job I was actually very struck with the first but when the second George Bush was president when he said you know after 9/11 he suddenly felt he understood why he was president but I was kind of worried that he didn't understand how when he ran for president but I wondered if it's like he suddenly thought oh I understand there is meaning to what I'm doing now doof do you feel that your work is meaningful in the grand scheme of things there's anything meaningful in the grand scheme what oh yes I think I think it is I think we don't want to see what people yes yes yeah there will always be even when the holograms and everything have been destroyed and it's a boring in the screen there will always be a mystery of one man walking onto an empty stage that fascinates an audience thinking of that when mmm I don't remind me when you pass on I've got a good part free it's a hologram thing or just we're just writing do you have any regrets on this have you here and investors not really not really honestly there are a couple of parts I think I would like to apply which I didn't get but this one okay yeah yes I made a little success in London and in Beckett the play about Beckett and king henry ii and i was furious when old peter o'toole my friend got it son of a what you do but would you do this I mean you know you have to qualify meaningful I mean if you're really talking in the grand scheme of things people love to see acting it it enhances their imagination if God forbid a nuclear weapon dropped he I don't think the actors are going to be the first responders you know he'll quickly let me do a monologue for you so I mean in the grand scheme of things I don't be a government I see how that's where mines gonna come exactly but you know but you know in a normal functioning society adding to people's imagination is a is a lovely profession you know why I think if we could come up with something to cure cancer I don't know that the two would be the it's it's a different it's a you know it's a locket he could dog doctor laughing while he's advantage well you know maybe maybe we maybe I just know I just don't sometimes I just you know don't know don't think that any I'm always aware everyday that what is there six billion people and five billion 999 million and nine hundred ninety eight or seven my wife and my two children don't give a about me and and I don't really mean that much to them I'm just aware of that and I don't think they don't think it's necessarily but I think you there is a there is an important value in entertainment I think there is an important value in something to distract people from their lives if you look at times the Great Depression is one of the biggest booms and movie you know people do need an escape and there is a something provided by I don't make I think that that makes it necessarily royalty I just think it's at one very nice function of society but just that's the way you define it because one of the films that you've directed and some of you starred in they're not justice caged that pretty challenging good night good luck is not what you think of the sky pissed entertainment but I don't I I think that there's it's still an entertainment it you know I I don't get to make policy when I play a guy running for president you know I I actually just you know your films in general we can't lead the way people a lot of times will say you're trying to lead society it takes you two years you know something happens it takes you a year to write the screenplay if you're lucky a year to get it done and out so we're usually reflective of that and sometimes there's periods of time and society society you can look from the mid sixties of the mid seventies in particular American films where we were reflecting the you know civil rights movement and women's rights moving the drug counterculture in the anti-vietnam you know we were reflecting those things we were talking about those and that that was something that the country was conscious up and was talking about and then we got away from that probably after Watergate ish and and that then we started looking for something to entertain more and challenge less particularly now it's got them so black yeah I'd rather live in my imagine your imagination tell nobody nobody wants to live in a world without art that would be a terrible world but I think I was taking you literally because what is reality television reality television is bad acting so in other words if all the actors died there'd still be plays they'd just be bad right if all the scientists died nobody would cure anything so I mean you know you could act yourself you might be bad my neighbor could do Lear I don't want to see it have you like fools are doing something other than acting kyrat team and if the world I wanted to be an eye doctor for a few years when I was kidding yes Chris what not you young I've started to studying the classics as a pianist we're one drunk yes what's your favorite Christmas Eve in his house there's a PA for Brianna Pierce oh my god can I go home with you yes darling you have more fun than I do that's a piece by Revell and I'm I've dried now this is honorific over I'll think about it let you know Nick how about you oh no they just know I wouldn't know what to do you know a lot of what we're discussing was the decision of whether to be in real life or mine they're nice and prepared not to be in real life it was horrifying but Cold War bunker is about my color was laid on us kids of just not any place I wanted to be so I felt at home when I hit the stage just absolutely at home even though it was the most horrific experience you could possibly have you're standing there in the wings like why would you do this to yourself why would you just go out and terrify yourself like you know up you don't move you're not going to another most horrific experience over the night but I prefer that to the horror of real life which is that pre you know it's not really a unless you bring exception as that but that's the way it was project it less and that's what we got a title for your autobiography yeah what for real life i buy it is my chest why fish fish why 10 horror no horror the horror any would any of you stone that you really think is having a clue on people's lives or socially it's a white were lobbying the other this one actually did have an effect on society there is one Lorenzo's oil I mean I shot and new science British SAS amazing Lorenzo's oil really works those after 20 years of doctor held out said well if Lorenzo lives past 30 then I believe that it works and he lived to 32 so I said Lorenzo's alright now I don't know how many people that affected Lorenzo I guess if they're a film that really changed you personally that one film that's really stamped you as an individual change your life Gary you mentioned the Malcolm McDowell film anything else you know what I did or one no another one that has really impacted you I mean this so that I couldn't list them there's there's so many but George is the one that's really shaped you as a kid you know you could watch Saturday afternoons you could watch movies you know that's how you really got to see a lot of black and white films I think the first time I saw a tequila Mockingbird sort of really I understood because he was sort of the reluctant hero I really that I was very moved by that I was moved by It's a Wonderful Life because I showed up every Christmas and I always thought that it was such an interesting film because you know the bad guy gets away Lionel Barrymore gets away with it at the end and you couldn't do a film like that anymore where the bad guy doesn't you know now you'd have to haul lionel barrymore away in handcuffs but yeah and you you know and i was very any still good but i was very impressed by older films like them Spencer Tracy Phil in hair the wind I love those films you know American films not forward from I I grew up in Kentucky you know that's what you saw you don't seem a very many foreign kristef what about you well same thing that Gary said you know there's there's so many because you're never like a stagnant entity that that remains the same so you you develop into whatever direction and and that's that's the part of the beauty of movies that they speak to you in a different language whenever they whenever you encounter them so I've seen a dump sorry I used that example before but I've seen eight and a half maybe twenty-five times and every time for the first time I've ever seen it and if the first time I've seen it I was about 15 and I had no clue what was going on yet it really was one big amazement and today I watch it well maybe tomorrow and it'll be something completely different Christopher well I grew up fortunately I grew up in Quebec so we got a lot of French actors that used to come over from Paris as well and then I'd watched them on the screen and in the 40s that was the best time for the French because they were both those wonderful theatre actors who also played in film and that that incredible Renaissance when Joanne while and people like that were directing it was this Superman and probably the film that I cried mostly at I still do actually is look around II was young because at the end when Jean got out and the woman who was trying to save them their lives and feeds them yes and should they fall in love and I've never seen on the screen anything more touching than the fact that you could just tell they had fallen in love because they don't ever look at each other Wow and he leaves without looking at her and it was an example of how how wonderfully unsentimental things can be that of course regurgitate sentimentality under the extraordinary stuff I also love the German school - of ever know Kraus and all that history of the German cinema yeah my favorite one was which my first wife hated she thought it was a worst film dr. Strangelove doing laughing profoundly affected me because if he hit half and all that stuff right in the Tommy bomb down the end I thought it was just great and then when I heard when Alan told me the story about Shirley named telling Stanley that he was just couldn't do it he couldn't do this these great actors Peter Sellers and Georgie Scott I I am NOT up to that quality and then Kubik said to paranoid I said yeah I'm terribly paranoid so keep it use it then never when Kubik asked Ryan to cut off his leg wasn't classy if you don't know about it I tell you okay I they shot everything they had could shoot without do his one leg and correct call him and he said you know it's just a terrible problem you know I've shot it from every angle we've tied up the leg we've done is we've done dissident news I have the best actors from sweet it's 60 minutes from taking it off to tie everything up and it's real simple and of course I'll double your salary I just think for the film that's the right thing rise it you you want me to cut off my leg no I won't do it but I think you can they're so lovely have you hear of Christoph and George thanks so much - doing this again and really everyone it's just an honor to have you here and I wanted to say my film the pawnbroker when I was in high school the way the reality of that film made me think oh look what movies can do because I've never seen a film until then that looked almost like a documentary yes and it's still hold on Sunday yes the backyard

Channel: melissafromri

Views: 62,126

Keywords: George Clooney (Celebrity), Christopher Plummer (Film Actor), Gary Oldman (Celebrity), Christoph Waltz (Musical Artist), Albert Brooks (TV Writer), Nick Nolte (Film Actor), Interview, award season, roundtable, 2011

Id: C8HizF1jieA

Length: 64min 45sec (3885 seconds)

Published: Tue Oct 20 2015