Clint Eastwood/Parkinson 2003 UK Interview

[Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] well my final guest is one of the truly great names of cinema as an actor in more than 50 movies he's brought to the screen a distinctive star which was your Burton was described as dynamic lethargy as a director of films like the Unforgiven and he's led his movie Mystic River he can claim comparison with the very best ladies and gentlemen Clint Eastwood [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] they're very fuel getting that kind of reception you have to know well after listening to been out there and he's very glib and and fast at that dynamic lethargy thing is maybe not gonna make it here it's interesting to see that reception you've gotten to understand that there are this wonderful man of cinema and for 50 years you've proved yourself a huge star and a great direction all that's something and to imagine that when you first start there are a couple of studio bosses who actually didn't think much to you I mean you were told you squinted too much you're told that your voice is too soft and they said your mother make a start and they were correct well they all of those things a squinting thing they they thought everybody thought that was affecting for some particular role but I just have sensitive eyes so there's sunlight at all and you have the same thing we all shine zout of me I can make Clint squint it's just look let's talk about this this new film it's that you've you've made go Mystic River which you directed from the novel by Dennis Lehane I've seen it twice now I think it's just a very remarkable piece of work and I read the New York Times there's no doubt you did it this morning I got it sent from them from America the review of it what I mean to say it's a revenues is to is to make them understatement of the year when you saw the the project first of all as a normal was it that's how you came across yeah and what was it that made you want to film it well actually I came across it as a synopsis I read the synopsis in a newspaper and then so I went out and got the novel also I had been familiar with Dennis Lehane you wrote some detective stories a series of detective stories over recent years and but this was a whole different thing for him this was a whole breakthrough novel and I like the story very much and the way it did the way it was designed and so I bought it I said I've got to do it what was it about the the book itself well is it a terribly emotional story and there's a there's something about the fact you got this emotional sort of tragic story going along and simultaneously with that you've got a detective story where they're trying to unravel it and the two elements are sort of converging towards each other and it's it's it's it's tough to explain really without it because it's a very complicated story so you're just all gonna have to see but it's a great drama isn't it that's what it is yeah it's a great drama and and and it was it was a challenge to do it and at this stage in my life I'm always looking for the challenge what about the the studio's well they're equally enthusiastic because you see this is a film that goes against the trend I think that the demographics are always looked at so so they say what what is the average theater-going age I don't know what it is myself but just guessing say it's 12 to 18 or something like that so that lets gotta make shows for 12 to 18 year olds I happen to think that 1670 18 year olds might enjoy this kind of story but they don't really get the opportunity very often because most things are geared around the action crowd or are things that were and special effects are so wonderful nowadays they're they're done so well that they become the motor factor for doing a movie the effects drive it so the story has become secondary where in the old days the story was primary and everything else sort of fit on top and that's always being your benchmark the story hasn't it that's really what you're interested in and telling the tale well I think that's it is for me anyway I figure without the story there's really no use to being out there all the actors in it without exception wonderful but Sean Penn's performance is one of the great piece of screen acting I've seen in recent years as good as that well I think he's an extraordinary young man he's he's done a lot of good performances he's rated very high Eric and cinema acting or cinema or theater and and he's he's better than he's rated and and Tim Robbins and and Kevin Bacon and Laurence Fishburne I just had a dream crew actually at Laurel ne and and Marcia Gay Harden I'd worked with before so I knew how great they were but but when you with the central performance which dominates the film in a sense because it centers around this man's grief from the effect it has on him it's extremely powerful performance you're the director when you see that coming at you I mean what what part you play with it what's what's your job yeah well the main thing is is to try not to screw it up I just kind of just kind of when you when people come in and they're well prepared and they and these people all were you just main thing is you set a nice atmosphere so everyone doesn't get their adrenaline up too early and then we start this start the scene is out well mind you look at the film now what do you make of it is it is it too soon feel to have a judgement I don't make anything you don't well is it for me it's very difficult because I've shot the film last fall here we are this fall and now and and edited throughout the year and done all that sort of things so I've looked at so many times that I don't really it's not it's not for me to really talk about or think about much anymore I just kind of presented out there and now it's the child that's grown up and it's time to go a leave home I think that uncle my point of view the date the Unforgiven was was your was a masterpiece then I think this is equally so I think that there's just two great defining films in yoga but your lips to God's ear right think but what about the the business yourself of acting because you're directed this movie and you're backing off aren't you doing directing acting in the same movie well I've been considering it it's a it's at some point it's kind of ridiculous I started in 1970 the only way I could get the film made play misty for me the only way I could get get it made was to to be in it to end so and then later I figured well if I can do this successfully for one two films maybe I'll be able to move around behind the camera and then of course one thing led to another and then the 30 33 years later I'm still doing it so but now I'm kind of moving towards the back it's also too I mean that what's interesting about the about your career in movies and they've done it in this film as well I mean you've written the music as well well I I write out the themes for us for some movies I did bridges in Madison County and and Unforgiven and they're just things that I I think fit the picture I'm sort of driven by the by the movie and that the involvement in the movie but music is your passion and was your passion before acting wasn't well I loved it as a kid I played a little bit and I played a little bit of a lot of things a master a master of none jack of all trades master of none kind of thing I played the piano for a while and then I played a trumpet for a while what will be what kind of venues were you playing and playing Club well when I was at out playing the piano over because in assemblies at school and stuff because it was a way to meet girls it was good so when I found out that I went home and started practicing then finally yeah I did I beat around Oakland California and I did play and one night club I used to frequently drop in because they would supply me with pizza and and anything that they served up there with it all for free and and how do you put the old cup on the on the piano and once in a while somebody put a quarter and that thing came gimmick him after that and then and again I mean they that the road was was interesting I mean he went to rawhide which was bizarre in many ways your acting school wasn't it you know directing schooling your producers go to because you learned in seven years and then that a lot well that that's the first steady job I had I had to do quite a few years where I didn't have steady jobs and they were kind of beat around jobs and played little bits here little bits there and go on different television shows and then rawhide was a steady job where you get to go to work every every day so that was that was great fun and then then I I expected a layoff after the series was terminated and I then I ended up getting lucky it with this Italian films with surgeon for the Oni mm-hmm and that's sort of that's then one thing led to another there and they're pretty soon daddy how are you yeah oh that's it all those years later are still still hanging out that baby the question why why what's the reason feel like jeopardy I just like it I think every movie that you do there's always something to learn there's always something new to learn about about yourself about acting about entertainment and so so as long as there's you're learning something it's a pleasure to do it it's a it's a great opportunity I think that's it's a great opportunity to be able to work in a profession that you actually enjoy and then a lot of people don't get that opportunity and I always feel extremely sympathetic yeah because of that I would've been lucky so I've fallen into doing what I want to do what about this this description by Richard Burton of your your acting style is dynamic lethargy you must have pondered this an awful lot of the yeah well I don't think richard ponder did too much he was great with it for coming up with little sayings he and I think he was always fascinated by the minimalist acting that is sometimes popular and American cinema I know he was a big fan of Robert Mitchum's and some of Robert Mitchum's early work and Gary Cooper this whole history of actors who were pretty darn good but they they definitely didn't show their hand any more than they had to so and as as technical things improved as television improved and everything the you could you could be more amenable it seemed like people would become more interested in what you were doing if you weren't just throwing it at them if if you made the audience sort of come half will meet you half away but it also mean I suppose it's part of your personality too because you all that some introverted person aren't you basically oh what I mean I thought I was being very extroverted the camera captures that there's something about there's something about the loner about you is something about that which the camera captures I think the camera captures a lot it feel allow it to once once you get to the point and and of course acting is is very easy for children children do it naturally because they can throw themselves into a role and forget that you're even standing around watching them and and and then of course yet they ask you to do that when you're an adult it's very difficult oh I don't want to see all those people out there and this and they and that a cameo throw this big camera in your face but once once that you realize that that people aren't unfriendly and the camera isn't unfriendly then you can concentrate on what you're doing well what about the actors that it's you've you've admired I mean Cagney was one wasn't it yes yeah when I was growing up I thought James Cagney I thought he was he was I loved I loved his boldness there was a certain thing a certain boldness in his performances he didn't seem to care he wasn't he wasn't reaching out and asking the audiences to like him or or what have you he played in the white heat course one of his famous pictures he shoots a guy through the trunk while he's eating a chicken leg and he's doing all these kind of things and I thought this guy has a lot of nerve I said I'd like to have that kind of nerve but what am i my favorite actors is James Stewart I mean I love James wall he's a very good God he's all that in there that is it a wonderful act he was he was a wonderful actor and a great person and you know something he he was terrific and nobody ever thought he could do westerns and they thought he was you know all those more gentle roles in the Philadelphia Story and what-have-you but then all of a sudden he did him and they found out that there was a certain inner fury to him yes he played he played the meant that the man who gets angry just about as good as anyone decent bloke losing it was I think he was everyman getting mad as hell I'm not gonna take it anymore the other nice thing that because I didn't even come down here come on my children what I liked about him too and they something I'd marry you as well is that you've been this this big star and yet you don't behave like this big star you don't have the entourage to you you don't have the limos and all that day you're absolutely right they did bring they did pick me up in a car though there was a Hummer or something nice vehicle and and yeah no we don't need entourage you know car whatever gets you there did you was there ever a point in your career the way where you thought you believed all of it the stardom and all that and it affected you I don't think so I think there's a you always have to you take the work seriously I guess I used this as my first day when I was mayor of Carmel - I said let's take the work seriously but for God's sake listen I'll take our selves seriously yeah and that's where you get in a bind is when you start taking yourself seriously then you're in for deep trouble I I think you may be not deep trouble a lot of people can fake through and do there there life but it's not really enjoyable I don't think you didn't when you a mare of calm I'll have any ambition to go on like mr. Schwarzenegger now take over the know it Thanks because I hadn't had a prior a political office a lot of people on this recall thing suggested running and I said not with somebody else's body we're going to end and then when Arnold Schwarzenegger got into the act it was interesting to watch how he does I mean how he conducted himself in the campaign he seemed to do rather well but there's no almost impossible job if you look at it I mean it so broke California it all do well this is it you say he's rich but it seems to me that there's been an awful lot of talk about well California's broke and Schwarzenegger is incredibly rich and you know so he knows a bit about money but he he made money playing action heroes in movies that's not gonna work for the seventh largest economy in the world I mean they can't do that it was the fifth no he is an impossible impossible situation he's gonna have to do a lot of work I wish him a lot of luck he's smart guy he'll he'll probably surround himself with a lot of really good money managers and people who who maybe can put him on the road to success but then he has to work with a legislative branch that is not the same parties and so he's gonna have to be a consensus builder you're every every decision it makes gonna make a lot of people unhappy and some people happy and so just go a good go I've done it on a small small venue and I know what it's like it but you have to kind of set your mind board it's a tremendous amount of work and he'll he'll yeah but you'd rather play golf wouldn't you what you playing off now what's your hand again 12 that's very good I can't get it down into single digits because I don't I unfortunately do other things but I love doing it keeps you off the streets yeah they're keys you haven't man Sofia I've been running for governor can I just ask you a couple of final questions um but they're talking about families here cuz you've not got a new new family haven't you you've got a young wife and of course you've got the six-year-old daughter I have a six-year-old daughter which keeps you young or else makes you prematurely old I'm not sure I'll have to figure out which which is which it is but now she's great and and and my wife and I've got a ten-year-old I've got a few children that are around and they do keep you young and keep you interested in and things and and I want to spend more time with them that's one of one of the reasons I'm back on work yeah gives your so Satan chances at fatherhood in a sense I mean the time that you you were spending of your father first up you're busy as we all are the career comes and you stand back and next thing you know your grandad you know my kids weren't giving me grandchildren so I had my own grandma but it's it's a it's a great time actually if a person if people could work it right and but it doesn't work that way and it doesn't especially for women but if they everybody could have their careers and everything first and then have children when they're maybe in their 60s or something and then they could relax and just enjoy the family I gotta ask you also to that's been Helen wants me to ask this question what's it like to be a sex symbol at 73 he wants to know cuz II don't know why he just gracefully as you do you still have to play the piano to pull the missus without the piano that did that or well I that doesn't romance her she's countless to that visually playing a small world or some little the children's tune which I'm relegated to these days okay well look they as I said I think the film was I hope it's good to be a big hit because I mean I think it's kind of film that you know grown-up people don't get to see anymore and I think you could be very proud of it I'm gonna do thank you and thank you very much um I guess not - Clint Eastwood's event Elton's into the saunas and show crew next week my guests are Billy Connolly Pamela Stephenson Michael Caine and REM until then very good night good night [Applause] [Music] hello this is Andrew Denton you've just seen Michael Parkinson doing what he does best interviewing people but what's he like when he's the one being interviewed it's a fascinating question and the answer can be found on Monday night at 9:30 in the ABC on enough rope when my very special guest is yes mr. Michael Parkinson see you then [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] you [Applause]

Channel: That's Entertainment

Views: 200,550

Rating: 4.8717375 out of 5

Keywords: Clint Eastwood, Interview, UK, Parkinson, Ben Elton, Eastwood

Id: zdbyBnfKsI4

Length: 21min 10sec (1270 seconds)

Published: Wed May 13 2020