Bette Davis, Salute to Peggy Wood--1972 TV Interview

[Music] six guests are Betty Davis and Peggy would maah afternoon at the tavern on the green here in New York City a great actress Peggy Wood will be honored she'll receive the fabergé straw hat special achievement award and it will be presented by another great actress and great friend of hers miss Betty Davis and that gave us a chance to have both of these two great ladies on our show it's been both of these great ladies both of these two is redundant it's been said that Betty Davis was the first actress to make movie acting respectable and she has couple of Oscars to prove that and history may just prove her the finest film actress ever Peggy would her good friend first start on Broadway in May time in 1917 and that's quite a while back probably everyone or nearly everyone according to the box-office receipts has seen her as the nun admonishing us to climb every mountain in the film sound to music she was the star of Mama on television as an amazing list of theatrical credits and it is always nice to see great actresses make their entrances and tonight you get to see two of them at the same time Miss Betty Davis and miss Peggy Wood [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] oh nice to meet you how nice to meet you sir yes why have they kept us apart so long we just we just Maxie we just met a moment ago I was in this theater when a known coward was here last year and Belmonts that's right and I was out there so you see there was this great barrier between us yeah I guess it's safe to say that you do have known each other for before tonight well yes we met you know when Miss wood was a superstar as we call them today at the Cape Playhouse and I was trotting up and down the aisle seating the theater goers and that is when I first met miss wood and she was you know perfectly marvelous to all such apprentices as we were then you were learning your trade well I wasn't really reading it because I wasn't allowed to do anything much that summer that uh sure I was learning how to be an usher a certain amout of doing you know with the flashlight and where are the seats can you still do that if you I don't think I'd want to know but I knew that she was an apprentice there because my late husband John be a weaver went to a performance of the apprentices and then came back to me pop-eyed he said I have seen a actress boys and girls and I think she's absolutely marvelous and he said that going into New York tomorrow I'm going straight to George Abbott's office and I'm going to tell him he has to see the name of Betty Davis and he did so did he know I never have met Mr Abbott but I appreciate what mr. Weaver did know I never met him all these years even you know what do you know I went to call me when I wasn't in the theatre more than about three or four years so I just do happen to happen all that time to get around to you I don't know if it's right well maybe I should stay you see in the theater but it worked out that I went to California say could I ask you both the question I don't know do I have Roquefort cheese on my face hmm you know that feeling I did a live commercial a moment ago and you know that feeling people are staring at something that you have all right I don't ask all my guests to fire broke her cheese dressing my bass I thought I would just do you ask the same thing when you get a pie in the face you know I've never had that in the army shows there is an old old vaudeville scheduled I'm sure you remember called the standard yeah it's a famous vaudeville sketch and the the star the show gets already you see and they get the pies ready and then they put the stand-in to take it right and I played the stand-in in all these army camps in Northern California I used to take about five pies a day sometimes a five show it is the most miserable because he goes all up your nose and the smell this you smell up this pie forever where did they find people oh the guys they loved it though it was such me was such fun to do what for all the servicemen you know it was particularly funny because I was doing it but I dunno about taking pots we ever hit by a pie that was not bland no I mean did you or did anybody ever have a surprise well I think that would really test your sense of humor if somebody is really pretty disastrous yes yeah well some people mean I think it's funny but we have a little surprise for you Betty [Applause] wouldn't that be wouldn't that test your friendship come into my face no no we wouldn't we wouldn't do you don't respect me anymore now you're gonna throw fires out it's just not true it's not this would is a suspicious that we actually everyone can see there no there will be no phase that we know of when was there a moment in your life where you can look back and say that that was the moment you decided to be an actress no matter what let nothing stand in your way well okay I'd like to say that I was am going to be a singer all my life from the very beginning I wasn't necessarily going to be an actress my father said to me I saw to it that you had Joe did you act so I said I thought do you know that everybody had to anybody can do it and it was mama singing roles you were an actress too oh yes I was in what they call a singing actress and and that meant that I could at least make some semblance of a resemblance of a person on the stage and not just a doll that you wind up I'm sorry but the only parts that I did of them in the musical world were all acting close to where you know when you really want to be something in the theatre you get a play that has you play for different ages then you're in anybody that plays I can look back over all of my colleagues and see if they're big successes always came well we have one now Sadie Thompson I prayed for different parts then you're in so that was me in me time that's right so I had to pay a young girl and then a Mary woman and then the old lady and then another young girl the granddaughter of the original young girl when I had a success in London in bittersweet air I prayed for different ages and you're sure you're made I would guess to that the hardest one to play would be the one closest to your own because for that really if you're young playing an old lady you can make yourself up but yeah but it is true that for a 20 year old person to play 30 would be harder then you can also add to the old old lady by charing yeah they'd love to see you Charlie what's missing stay with it we're back it's been the band was playing the going near the Noel Coward death yes and you saying that in the most beautiful voice I'll never forget your voice was exquisite truthfully was you know it was honest she was singing you love singing not necessarily and was not miss Mouse exactly I thought I could go around and see what I had do so when I was just out of the chorus I managed to Arthur Hammerstein together not an audition with it old man Oscar Hammerstein of the Opera the old Oscar Hammerstein yes and so I went to sing for him and he listened politely for a little phone and he said yes a very pretty voice oh I always know what a very pretty voice is what it was and but there was no not so beautiful as all that he didn't think so well really our friends it's some people tell us that it's impossible for actresses to get along through the years not how we've seen this is so long since we've seen each other yes and um she's in Maine that would be in California I would be in London and she teleported we move on because of my really meeting miss wood at the Cape Playhouse I asked but the privilege of giving her the award tomorrow because I thought it was a kind of a link between us you know the playoffs and the the Henry Fonda I was the first year for the achievement Henry Fonda was a second Miss wood is now the third year the achievement award and we were all at the Playhouse in exactly the same time the same year Hank was beginning his career but he he had parts to play and I was assured and of course she was a star you know it was a strange thing that the three of us were all at that beautiful Cape Playhouse who for the first one you know the interesting Stevie Ray one that ever was program with your names and small type and keep those good for you mr Wood what do you think of this modern phenomenon of these actresses coming on television and telling their most intimate details of their lives and and should I leave no no but you know that these days things are discussed publicly that never were years ago oh you mean the actresses are doing or they're playing parts that do it both they do both come on shows like this and tell anything that's right I had to do it once I'm not a young woman I I don't I sometimes discuss my virginity but that's not experiences they discuss yeah I haven't seen them maybe something told me not to be caught up in that because one of these days you would ask me what I thought you don't have that reputation I guess you know that but what happened with Miss Davison I don't know who surprised who most that night because we've been discussing how in an interview we trust each other because we know each other and I said you know I wouldn't ask you anything that you own anything like you know who we used to ask all these questions so yes and so then you as a joke ask me this question as an old one of those interviewers colonists would ask and I said well you know I'm going to answer you and his face but then I felt you say I felt it was not a bad taste actually because um it had you had to do with my being marriage you know I think if I told you when I lost my virginity to some unknown fella somewhere I'm rather original today even though that you Mary is a virgin and I did so I thought it wasn't a bad taste that at all but it was kind of fun besides it didn't it didn't bring back the fat but it was more talk about that I guess and we both look started well you didn't look startled at all I did you got an award from the king of Norway which I find intriguing yeah and it's occasionally given sorry it's a decoration a decoration decoration best friend and the Norwegian government and they came decided to give this thing to me and another network thought I was I don't suppose that they mentioned it they would give a big luncheon and they know which council and head Council would have this thing to be as in Louisville the king who just didn't go running around and give me awards to anybody so we had the thing a big to-do and it very nearly didn't come off because it was given at the border of Astoria and they know agent council wouldn't go on with it because the Waldorf had decorated the entire room with swedish flags once they got there no bitching flags put up then we went through the little ceremony and they thing pinned on me and then we sat down to lunch and the young man and obviously in the advertising world with Madison Avenue world sat down next to me and he said Tim now when are you gonna have your audition the word for being presented to a royal tea is audience and he said what are you since a man who put up the flags possibly then I went to to Norway because you was I say the King doesn't come out of the country you go to him and then you find out when he will be seeing you and you find out through your embassy I dislike doing the talk show made it because I didn't have any script I didn't have any idea what I was to do or say I didn't know whether to understand in line and curtsy or what so I went in and he said you'll find it so I did I I didn't know the words I didn't know the script I didn't know anything you speak Norwegian well I speak a few words but and I went in and the King oh he said read one thing it was to wear a dark dress and don't turn your back on the King things I knew anyway so I went in and he had met me at a desk in the middle of this big room a roll-top desk and I went in and he had met me halfway to the door then he sat down I discovered he was going to speak English beautifully as he did and he hid he said were you with my birthday party well the birthday party was the whole of Norway the day before and a parade and I watched you know that that man had walked down the center of the biggest street with no guard at all and from crossing to crossing his arms were filled with flowers as the children came up to give me only and when the thing was over I really would like to tell this to the whole of the United States there wasn't a piece of the lily cup or debris in the place at all it was absolutely clean how do they manage their their clean people is he personable or did he seem like could you well nursery rhyme that fitted with something and he knew it and he slapped his leg along with his pussycat pussycat where have you been I've been to London to see the Queen but I've been to Oslo to see the king and he was I didn't know that while I was going to get out of it because he want to keep on talking I knew that I couldn't stay long the time but he talked to me not so much about the momma show that I did which this medal is given to people who do make a sort of rapport between people outside of Norway and no way to and there have been killed actresses from Holland or there it's not always it's a sea captain sometimes and anybody but it was time to go hey one nice thing he said what have you done in our country I'm sure that was just on the on the air there's an interview they said whether they pay you and I told him he says well you see they will pay me anything so he says I talked to the Chamberlain and he said that was my job how about that that's more so then I remembered when he got up that I was not to go to the door by turning my back on him so he moved along with me a little bit and as I trying to make my bow he had going back to his desk so he save me from making an oppa it was that was quite an experience I wish more Kings at his manners the ones I've met have been perfect slobs I strange to meet king no I never have been but I can't imagine if he went on like that how you would end the conversation I mean you can't you be tempted to say things like you're not the only King I'm seeing today we'll be right back after this message of interest over let me ask you both of you ladies this there are two cliches that always go around about people go into the theater one is the the theaters where unhappy children in debt and the other more recent one an article I read about Nicol Williamson the actor and that is that the theater is not we're unhappy children go but where the parents favorite would end at the most adored child because they've been the center of attention as children and the only place they can ever get that Universal center of attention again is on the stage and so they go into the theater for that reason is there anything to any of this no no children that go on the stage I put there by ambitious stage mothers who are really what Tigers mm-hmm and they put their children on the stage what was that that was a Cole Porter don't put your children on the stage yes and in an elevator one time coming down from CBS oh I mentioned another and there was a little boy and with his mother and his mother had a real face of a stage mother statue recognized in the block mm-hmm well anyway there they they were and he said with a deep sigh I wish I wasn't in this business there's a family in California they've had about well this is at the time of all this in heaven to which is many many years ago and we had one of their children they raised them for movies they kept them at every age for movies we just bred them for that seriously and little renowed was about four years old probably one of the brightest dearest children I've ever known in my life but they never let him go outdoors because he got all the sickly parts he was having his life ruined I kept him in the shade no indoorsy that's awful there's your answer your question I've never been able to answer that question of why why any of us in the beginning because with all the nerves of theatre every time I'm in an opening night dog even coming on here tonight I still have my nerves to come on here and my famous expression is why didn't mother tell me you know because it is a diabolical business because you don't understand what it's going to be when you start and maybe it's just something you have to do I think it's probably something you just have to do I think that's it it's so silly but it's something in you that has to express yourself in another way than just growing up in suburbia and reading an ordinary life something about you was a little different now if you don't if you see someone who doesn't have that Betty and you know that they are knocking themselves out and they're never gonna get anywhere a young actors can you can you take them aside and say look you you don't have enough stuff kid well it's a pretty hard thing to do because many many young people I think you will agree in the beginning seem to have nothing at all yeah and and and with work and lots of training which has not done so much anymore the training part they they do they develop when they sometimes don't seem to have a natural talent at all I think some of those people become better performance because they really have to work harder and this is the the person born with a natural voice you know where they say you're going into opera tomorrow I think maybe get spoiled very young could you because it is basically work and learning and there are no shortcuts and I think all this you will agree with but often you can't tell in the beginning if the person has it or not I was certainly the least likely young woman to succeed no no yes because of my New England background I was certainly no type of a that you would think would be an actress before I started studying boys you couldn't have heard me down to those people in the first row plus you know a real Yankee accent you know I'd say Papa pop the card I would swear you know in the first time in dramatic class that I read this sentence cuz they all burst out laughing and I burst out crying with humiliation so it's a very risky thing to take upon yourself to play God with town that's often when forty years have gone by and it's a great friend and they're starving to death I have had the courage to say really and she stopped me sounded differently than I meant it really but well it's a good rule if they haven't eaten or gotten a job in 40 years 40 years old because they don't you working about 20 but this is particularly with a man this is a tragedy to me this is a tragedy because they always think it will happen this is one of the magic parts of the theater and one of its worst points because for instance I gave myself five years nobody had seen I had anything in five years I would have changed my profession there's always that hope that just tomorrow might mean it well this is this this doesn't eventually happen after a while but you see one of the things that is very important about hard work well of course anything to do with live it to me it's not hard work at all it is a very exciting experience anything that you do with it but then there is a thing that most heart once said and it is so true look lots of luck and this it's heavy the right part come at the right time walking around the corner and walking into them a man who was a producer said just the person I've been yeah that's the sort of week that's the fairytale part of it that's right but they may have the the ability and the gift but the luck may not come you really believe that's true yes I do believe I believe there are some people who never sort of made it mmm that it was they had great talent but no luck you think that's possible yesterday as possible except if you make the better mousetrap its ability there yes but there he was fun I'm gonna admit to you you find when the person has the gift somehow that something happens but somewhere along the line you've got have to yes I agree excuse me ladies we must take a pause [Music] talking with two superb actresses Betty Davis and Peggy would the award that you're about to receive not here tonight but tomorrow is looks exactly like this that's really a classy looking award it's a straw hat attractive it's called the Council of stock theatre straw head well this is this and not the one this is I think it's very nicely done that's not amber but what would you call it I think it's a funny thing about it's called straw hat and that that should have I'm about to be it's in that label and because in the beginning they called barn shows I have a feeling some newspaper reviewers started calling it the straw hat circuit and you never see straw hats at seven theaters none of those people I brought down the aisle in the cable Betty can you do can you tell a friend if her work is lousy you're always confronted with that and somewhere in your career you see a friend and I have a lovely story about that all right who ain't Kernan vo not at all I didn't have an answer and Jencarlos very well-known had a very dear friend but was a mediocre actress and because she was an old friend Jane went to the opening night and knew she had to go backstage and say something so she swept into the room with her hand out and said aren't you glad you're you and walked out because this is the most gasps the experience you can have if you've seen a play that you really it just didn't work and the friend and just what to say is terrible but that's a marvelous life that's like the bachelor who stayed a bachelor all many many years and all his friends married they'll because they all had children and so he thought oh most of them were hideous the children of course so he used to say my that is a baby it would be pretty hard to do rich oh yeah it would be especially after an opening night it would be impossible maybe later if they really came to you and wanted to discuss it you could but not after the hell of an opening night because there's nothing worse than this in the world but they act for the performer no terrible yeah we ever get through it any of us I never have known you both you both are in the theatre and also married and their families and so on can you can either of you conceive of if you had it to do over today where there's an article in today's paper where less meant more and more young women interviewed say they don't want to marry or if they do they want to wait a long time can you say whether you today the same you would you oh yeah I wouldn't know waited long enough [Laughter] what makes the difference why would you waited much longer oh I think I would be wiser in my choice said I waited longer I don't think I was grown up enough to know you know what was right for me well does it have to do with the fact that you said you felt and were raised to believe that sex and marriage went together so if you were raised in an age when it was thought that they don't necessarily like that have made it easier well that would make it quite a lot easier yes okay okay you know I often wonder about somebody who has achieved stardom and all and seen their name up in lights over the title and all that stuff if they can remember the first time that they found that it didn't solve all their problems you know what I mean I mean for example you can say well if for example you miss where do you think of Betty saying now here I'm an Academy Award winner and I'm in Medan admired and loved even as you can tell from the applause and ever you come in and yet here I am sitting here at home bored depressed it's not magic well it isn't and and and that part of it to me was never the great part of it anyway that well that was a beautiful thing and in the eyes of the world your reward but the doing of it was always the great thrill to me yeah you know and the acceptance of the name over at all is a very necessary part of it what one would wish for it but it doesn't solve anything because actually from that moment on you have to be better and better yeah see this is and each year you know each year you you have a standard you set for yourself and it gets tougher and tougher and you are often bored and and in this day of no scripts and you have to you're in the position of trying to top yourself this is right and in a day of very few scripts this is even more difficult you see because what you find that can top yourself you know of some of the great parts you had before that's one of the things I wanted to talk about this straw hat theater there was the chance for the young actor to get what is achieved in in end where they played the classics in there and there was there not some earth into their repertory this almost gave the American actor a chance for some repertory yes and there's where they learned to play in the classics which is the real way to match yourself up against what's is the great stuff and these these little theaters did it because all kinds of actors are though all kinds of ability we give their eyes and ears to play these classics because they know that is the basis of their work and there's where they got it now they don't get it anymore now they have packages plays that play in all the summer theaters on a circuit and they can be just a business of earning and a summer salary that's all it's not the business of learning anything that you wanted to do I mean I never was asked to go and do any Shakespeare and there's somebody you know we never got a chance to do it the only way you got to do a Shakespeare thing was to have a well-known star whose manager decided he could afford the money to lose on shape so that's the way I get a chance to go to play Porsche because when Sir famous wanted to do a protection of the relation to Venice for George Arliss absolutely smashing his fortune that's what I thought too you were that I saw you do that he would just Marvel's I thought there was a wonderful chance and I would have liked to have done many more but the only other chance I had to do was the best package in the cemetery when I did the Taming of the Shrew with Ronald Peters and a very fine Lloyd Bridges and they were too far between they're too far between we should have had a great many more opportunities excuse me both of you again we must take this message we'll be right back [Music] we almost caught you doing it tonight what is that I was about 20 years ago she was company 20 years ago wasn't it maybe 72 that was a little about 55 don't tell me there was a musical revue did Andre why don't you do Broadway again I saw you the last time you run terrible and iris I feel badly what I feel badly I hate theater at this age I feel badly because I should do theater not see and I could play many more parts in theater yeah today at my age that then I ever will be able to play on the screen again you know it's a tragedy I thought I don't know how I can get over it the only trouble with seeing you in the theater is that when you enter the applause goes on so long that you miss your train going oh my son I saw night of the iguana when you were in you must have had to find things to do if you get an opening hand you'll never you just accept it and go on with your play I had no alternative but that is the power of motion pictures yes see motion pictures are extraordinary image to people and if they ever saw they'll take you to their hearts even in this country that there's they're always loyal to England even war but true here too I had to take a bow or we could never have done the play most unprofessional you just this is just not alone it was almost as if you had done a song you just had to stop I tried everything to I'd find everything are there ways to kill applause and I tried everything now this is gonna post thing this was and he was a wonderful compliment to me but it was a distressing thing to I have heard actors and actresses say I killed that laugh not on an entrance probably because not much you do back that but if you have a line that may or may not get a laugh or you want to cut the left short they say there are ways of killing she was the laugh of the other actor [Laughter] that's their profession trying to ruin your performance with a song in in London I deliberately killed applause it was such a tender beautiful lovely thing and if I had applause it would have been a mistake yes and I had to have them they audience go yeah at the end of the song that's right that's all but how did you do it it's not automatic it's that easy this is a way of doing it this is a way of doing it in the world yes sometimes if a curtain comes down at the end of the play and there isn't one sound yeah at the end for your minute or two you know yeah do you do you find miss wood that there's too much honoring of actress that's a lot of thing to ask you the day before an award but some people are of this opinion that you can just there's too much award giving I don't approve of it very much it's too bad we have not any kind of decoration that goes to people in the tops of their profession sisters have in other countries a real a real done by publicity and it's done by people who know they kind of award their giving I mean you get the first you gets it Sir Laurence Olivier that's good enough and you have other the ladies are Dame's and then there are other awards given in other countries so I think much of a muchness probably because in my time nobody gave any awards with anybody except that somebody ditched me out of them award for the mamma show but I did well I get done out of there in England active there's no National Honor for an actor here is there no national national news for a knighthood hmm then of course the English names go better with necessary Sir Michael Redgrave sounds nice sir chill wills for example wouldn't I make her up an amazing [Applause] how much time left s would you were saying it's too bad that there's no a repertory but I guess college drama supplies that for a lot of kids only place you can get to see the classics if you're an adult and they're doing you're involved in that I can train crazy well I started to just a because they don't allow that we had a whole arrangement of how it would work and then of course we couldn't get any money to do it yeah and the government didn't want to give us any money y'all know they didn't approve of that as you see the government has a way of feeding what McCartney calls the blight of the Puritans that anything so many of these things that we know should be done in the cultural way and Avista the congressman underneath Feliz are proposing college drama and we finally did it did breakthrough after the war and colleges were building theaters and cultural centers and not only colleges about seven communities and they didn't even think it put in them and now they have and though they have extraordinary performances I was there and went out to California to seize the regional per pharmacist and then I saw those that had one and even in their awards for excellence and there's no first second or third it's just for excellence then a wonderful actress granny in their Beverly Hillbillies said that the theater and the entertainment world have been so wonderful to her she has established a foundation and she gave to each one of the regional Best Actor $500 and then she gave another big one when they came into Washington all ten shows so all over the country two thousand dollars to the young man Ryan a beautiful thing she had been in vaudeville to know all her life and their family before and I have that feeling about the things of what she could do this is so so moving and it could get more theater on the road you know I've got some people think of just in New York and overall intelligent theater goers are out of you know yeah definitely there's no question because I did one-night stands for eight months with the Carl Sandburg show most incredible people come to the theater all over this country yes and they post the college audiences you know as you said the beautiful little theaters they have some of these colleges they have a theater Charlotte's bill the University of it Virginia I catch oh it was they can hear you down there it's true though you're constantly stand knocked out by utilities in in small town oh but as you say they don't have lots to go in they don'tthey sensational because most of our theaters are pretty uncomfortable and outmoded now you know there really are I know in a jam crowded and uncomfortable a New York theater audiences are no cup of tea there I mean they're a bit snobbish you know they have a terrible time really they're built not for the comfort of the actors and certainly not for the comfort of it Oh people and those that have been built since the Wars I say in the outlying districts I'm much more beautiful and much more interesting to playing oh when there was a great burst of theatres being built in the 20s and the Schubert's built them um winter famous was then doing a lot of producing a very distinguished gentleman and he thought he'd go around and see how these things were shaping up so he went into the Plymouth and found that they had no dressing rooms on the ground floor everybody had that and then actors were human beings until they were out in front it did not matter how you don't know the choruses in this in the city where they dress down in these steam rooms they're literally Sinn féin rooms all the pipes for the whole theater yes you know they never believed we were people until that curtain went up didn't kill miserable backstage just Mr Eames went into sees own theater the booth and they forgot to put a box office in its what do you mind my being one of the last to congratulate you and your 80th birthday good night the two remarkable women Betty Davis and Peggy would thank you for being here at the trick [Applause]

Channel: Alan Eichler

Views: 76,337

Rating: 4.8387909 out of 5

Keywords: Bette Davis (Performer), Peggy Wood (Performer), The Sound of Music (Film), Mama (TV Production), Interview (TV Genre), Hollywood, Broadway Theater, Television Program, Maytime (Play), Bettersweet (Play), Blithe Spirit (Play)

Id: 1OJb5Q1xHfM

Length: 45min 18sec (2718 seconds)

Published: Fri Apr 06 2018