Conversations at Home with F. Murray Abraham

welcome to the foundations conversations at home program i'm janelle reilly from variety the foundation has set up a coveted relief fund in order to support thousands of union performers who are going through tough times since march of 2020 thanks to your donations the foundation has given nearly seven million dollars in emergency aid to more than seven thousand performers and their families if you are a sag-aftra member and you need help please ask and if you can help please give information can be found in the description of this video thank you for your support and now without further ado it is my pleasure to introduce today's guests please welcome f murray abraham thank you so much for being here pleasure this is an audience of your fellow sag after actors so i actually always like to start at the beginning by asking how did you get your sag card i um i was uh i became an extra here in new york city but i got my equity card in la and when i came here it was easy because you were you know a member of the other union to become a member of the of the sister union in those days i don't know what it costs these days but uh i could just barely afford it in those days i hear that a lot that like the money you get from your first job a lot of it has to go towards the sag fees first of all i'm a very serious union man okay let's go right right up front great i was actually kind of hoping you would say it was from the fruit of the loom commercials you infamously were the grape i believe oh it was the leaf man the leaf the leaf great beef baby it was fun making commercials in those days was was actually it's a lot of fun and it paid up it allowed my wife to quit working i i made a lot of commercials um and i know i believe you grew up in texas which is obviously far from the industry what sort of piqued your interest in acting well i i grew up on the border of mexico i i used to think i was i still have a mexican soul i speak spanish i'm uh i love the culture but uh i had no idea about the theater it was kind of a small town small-time hoodlum really i was i was going nowhere and uh jupiter delinquent is what i was and when i was 16 a teacher said to try this i don't know what she saw in me because i had no literary interests or background at all my people are all blue-collar hard-working people coal miners steel workers and uh i stepped on the stage and i knew exactly where i belonged and from that i won a contest in texas i became i got a scholarship to go to school wouldn't have been able to otherwise it was a hundred dollars scholarship to go to college wow yeah the university of texas at el paso and then after that uh about a year that i um i summed my way to l.a and uh started looking for my my life do you remember that first play you did in school oh sure the first reading was was shakespeare the first time i studied was a julius caesar but the first play the play i won was the old lady shows her medals a wonderful one-act play i know that play i i don't think i've seen it but i feel like i've seen people do scenes from it yeah it's a winner yeah so um how did you end up studying under udahagen at the hp studio in new york city i'm gonna guess that was a huge turning point yeah well after the play when i got my equity card in la with the wonderful ice cream suit i did it with uh with ray bradbury it was his play and he remained a friend for all his whole life he was a very good guy anyway uh we ran for about eight or nine months which is a long time in l.a it's a long time anywhere and i decided in that period i didn't like the way actors thought of themselves in l.a i didn't like the one-dimensional aspect they i'm not saying they're one-dimensional actors but if they do the same thing over and over again if they sell that thing that they do they become that thing i saw it happening and i was told that's what i should do that i should make a trademark of some kind and sell that because the competition was so fierce and i i didn't want to do that i wanted to be a great actor and i didn't think that was the way to do it so as soon as the play closed my wife and i with whom i've been together for almost 60 years now by the way my wife and i pulled up stakes and went to new york to study and i auditioned for miss hagan and she remained my only teacher what you were saying about actors in los angeles i wish i could tell you which changed but that sounds very similar to uh a lot of actors today so i'm glad you beat a path to new york um i mean working with udahagen like i don't know if at that time she was as revered and you know iconic as she is now but i have to imagine for you like that was that must have been huge yeah yeah it was uh it was wonderful a hell of an audition uh it was very important to me and uh yeah it was huge it was a big step because it decided to reassert my confidence in myself and my in my instincts which is what i really rely on as an actor i'm a i'm a very technical actor but i'm i trust my instinct first and foremost i'm curious what sort of career you were imagining for yourself was theater your first love or did you always want to be filming tv no because because i discovered myself in the theater in high school and then in college but uh i i really like the i like being on stage a lot for one thing there are no filters between you and the work you know and that's a great discovery in movies and in television the idea that you really do have a second shot and those experts can make you look a lot better and make you look acceptable because sometimes it ain't working you know and it stinks and if you're on stage and it stinks there's nothing you can do you you don't like to admit it but you know when you're no good and it's just awful but uh you know you go you plow through and the next day you you improve you you have eight shots a week i like that a lot it gives you a chance to refine the work that really is one of the reasons that in i don't want to damn these actors who only do television or only do the same kind of character each time i i don't want to diss that at all because you got to make a living and in our business in television particularly there's a real crunch a time crunch because it's so expensive and you're hired to deliver the goods now we have a certain amount of time we've got a certain amount of stuff we've got to do and we'll take right now whatever you can deliver but we can't give you any more time to play with it i understand that so you begin to hone your craft and your talent to be able to deliver a certain thing that you know they're looking for and they rely on you for and most important that they hire you for if you take a look at some of the great old early movies the great character actors that you see surfacing time and again you know what they're going to deliver before you hear them you see them you know what they're going to do and at the same time they do it so well it's perfectly acceptable and you want them to do that that's what you expect of them but that doesn't mean i have to do that i i just i'd rather not i'd rather do king lear from time to time i i do that doesn't mean i'm a superior actor or a superior person it's just the way i feel no i mean obviously you you've done tv you're doing it now with mythic quest yeah it's a great show i'm curious though growing up were there actors whose career paths you wanted to emulate or you sort of looked up to i know it must have been unusual at the time being your mother is italian i believe your father was a syrian immigrant i don't know if you had people who looked like you or you know that no i suppose people like um oh gosh when i heard myself when i decided i was i was an actor you know just born to be an actor i started to listen to myself on tape recordings an old tape recorder my father was one of the he was he had one anyhow the point is i listened to myself and i realized that i wasn't sounding like some of the announcers on television and radio i wasn't sounding like some of the people i was sounding like someone from the border of mexico i had an accent so i began to study the uh recordings of uh of the british actors we we all make that mistake but uh i thought that was the way to speak if you wanted to speak properly and i really worshiped olivier i loved the way gilgood talked and uh so ralph richardson too i still love him a lot but and then and i really studied and i broke out of that accent and uh and then when marlon brando came along everything else stopped he really changed my life did you ever get to work with brando i'm wrecking my brain i know okay no i didn't damn it i didn't i don't know if i could have been able to i i held him in such awe no i'm sure i could have yeah i'm sure he was a good man when when uh his uh when his stuff was auctioned at sotheby's here in new york i bought a bunch of his stuff his son christian at the time god rest his soul invited me to sit with him and i was bidding on his father's goods the stuff i could afford some of the stuff was just too expensive i tried to buy the godfather's script but when they started to go for two hundred thousand i said no i can't do that but i did buy lamps and things and tchotchkes and furniture i've got a kind of a brando room to us i really liked him a lot not only for his work but the way he lived his life yeah yeah i mean again like utah and you can't get better than that she worked with him that's right of course yeah did you ever ask her about working with her oh yeah of course she tells us you got time for a story quick story of course so she was doing uh she was doing um the tennessee williams she was doing um style shame on me a streetcar named desire but when she came into the show um she was replacing and brandon was taking off for a vacation and when it came time for him to come back into the show he didn't show up for the rehearsal he showed up for the performance without ever having rehearsed with her wow but she as far as she's concerned she's ready let's i know the role you know your role let's just do it let's get it on and they did it was sensational wow god just trying to imagine what it would have been like to see that yeah yeah yeah so a lot of i have i admire a lot of actors mostly americans frankly really oh yeah yeah yeah we don't get enough credit for what we've done i think brando changed the course of acting both among the brits they'll tell you the same thing people say it was it was monumental but uh not only that it's just that i think we do shakespeare better than the brits frankly i'm so glad you said that i feel very strongly about that we're pressure we bring something quite refreshing and new to it the brits as much as i like them and have many good friends and work with them and then like like admire many of them i think sometimes they take it for granted that they have a lock on it and once you feel that way about your work it gets pretty dull if you start feeling that way about yourself i think you're dead i think you're finished i agree with you because i think we're a little less precious about it if that makes sense and by the way i've been fortunate enough to see you in shakespeare i got to see merchant of venice uh gosh many years ago it feels like oh at the broad yes yes yeah boy i loved that performance i was that was one of my favorite performances real it's a great production yeah yeah yeah and it seems like when you started out at least you know from history's perspective you seem to work right out of the gate and really in some impressive projects you were in serpico all the president's men working on and off broadway and everything from the ritz to uncle vanya um did you find that you were consistently working because that's what it feels like just looking at the resume but i know it probably feels very differently for you it was different you're talking about a long career so i mean you know there were long dry spots you know it's the same as everyone goes through it's awfully hard that's why it's so important that we support each other when when we have the money we really have to contribute to our to our union for what they're doing i i really am strongly believe in that share what you got yeah there were long periods of time and uh it's very painful all those doubts but you know when you do that when you have those long dry spells and i was i've been very lucky but when you do have them you really have to continue studying that's hard to convince anyone but you really have to work out every day you got to do your physical stuff you got to do your vocal stuff and you got to read you got to keep the memory going i work on sonnets i memorize stuff even when i'm not doing a play i it's important i like it i enjoy it i think there was actually a point where you sort of stepped away from acting in in the late 70s is that accurate to say no i think acting may have stepped away from me so i can't i can't i can't imagine not not thinking about being an actor i taught for a while but because it was such a pleasure but it was once a week and uh i was always looking and aside from all that i had a bad thing with a i'm not going to blame anyone for this but there are sometimes when we can become ourselves a little too precious about our so-called talent and gifts and you begin to think because you've won a few awards you want to become become very selective about certain things well it's good to be selected but you have to keep working you gotta you gotta i'm not telling you you should do crap but don't turn down everything just because it's not perfectly right that's a i think people do that from time to time but i think the only way to really prove that to yourself that you have the talent that you think you do is just to get out and work and in new york there are so many venues at least there were before the stupid pandemic there's so much theater i've done street theater children's theater and i'll do it again correct me if i'm wrong but i think you were you were actually right before the pandemic getting ready to do something here in l.a yeah no was it was it was going to be out here we were going to do it in la eventually but it was a terrific piece we're just about to open and we're going to do it again early next year it's a terrific it's really so good i can't wait to do it is this the ethan cohen script no unfortunately god i love doing his stuff we really communicate no that's uh the uh it's uh it's a play based on a conversation between norman mailer and his son buffalo and it's um it's it's really really good it's all norman's actual words we don't invent anything for him and one of the things he says in 2004 is when the conversation took place he says you can't stop a man who's never embarrassed by himself that's what he said in 2004 that's the kind of prescience the man had anyway uh so i guess it's fair to say it's been a long time since you auditioned for anything but you know going back to those early days how were you at auditioning i was uh i have to i hate to say i i like to teach i gather a class together perhaps once a year maybe once every year and a half and i go over to the atlantic theater company and they gather a pretty big class and we do scene work together because i i enjoy it and i'm good at it uh but uh i i also get a lot back from the from the class i get their energy back again and their ambition and i need that zits every once in a while i do as much as dedicated as i am i have to be reminded i don't want to get too complacent because i am successful and i i have some money in the bank and i have a i have a good life but you can get a little fat up here if you don't if you're not careful and you listen to these people and they confront you these students are smart anyway i tell them they have to be careful not to get resentful because i've met a lot of actors who do that because they're not doing the work that they think they should be doing or they're not they're not getting the respect that they think they deserve and they do deserve it if you can use a word like deserve but what happens is they begin to resent it and be angry and you carry that into an audition and i mean i know that early on i was doing that i was scared you they smell that they know that they're not stupid what you're upset about auditioning pacino tell me that he he enjoyed auditioning because he looked on it as though it was a chance to to try to act to to to to rehearse to do his chops i found it difficult and and it that comes through you know they know us better than we know them they see 200 of us when we see one of them that's you you got to swallow that crap you you know what they want to do is see what you have to offer there's only one the only reason they're seeing you unless they simply have to because the union said so is because they don't have what they want they're looking for something maybe they have an idea but they're not positive what you have to show them is the thing that only you have i'm sure you've heard this before when you say it i believe it you there's only one you right you've got to find out what that is or at least search for it in their presence because if you show them this thing that you are that they cannot see anywhere else if they want that you've got the job but if they don't want it they're not going to forget you because they've never seen anything like you and i'm guessing uh over the years one job leads to another even if you necessarily book the job in the room i'm absolutely that's another thing people have to remember you you're so right you're doing this not only for right now but for the future reference they'll remember if you're a pain in the ass believe me i mean obviously a huge moment in your career was with 1984's amadeus in which you played antonio salieri um i know milos forman adapted the play for the big screen um as director i should i should not short peter shafer the writer how familiar were you with the story and and how did you go about landing the role in the film yeah when it was magic it was one of those lucky absolutely lucky things because he and peter it's pronounced shaffer by the way jeffer oh my god i've been saying it wrong all these years after two double f but he he uh he worked with shaffer for six months on that adaptation by the way they fought each other for six months to get it the way it is thought work together but um but it was a wonderful adaptation but as far as how i got it uh when they were auditioning people here in town for the for the supporting actors at that point in my career i didn't want to be a supporting actor any longer they wanted people to come in and do a improvisation as a group and i didn't want to come in and and try to audition for a supporting role to support some british actor i hate to be taking off on the brits i really i know there are some i love i mean gary oldman is just wonderful you know and of course helen mirren with whom i've worked on on broadway she's just a treat i'll do anything for her but my point is that it was written by a brit for a brit and the brits had great success with that role salieri i mean the man who created it got won the best the biggest award though the guy who did it here got won the tony and i knew it was going to go to a brit but i insisted i said i just want to be i don't want to see any i'm not going to do any other robot that one can you imagine what the hell so they said no and then he invited me to be in the improv group a second time and i said no i really want to read for that and i knew it was not going to happen and then shortly after that he did call and say i want to see you for that and we had an interview and he completely ignored me telephone was ringing constantly it was about a five minute interview i was furious i was trying to hide it the producer was there too and i kept looking at it i was like what are what's going on he's answering the phone he's asking me a question and they mean then he takes a phone call anyway after about five minutes i said okay that's it and goodbye nice to meet you and i i was so mad and i went to a friend's place and complained and that's and yeah the point is a couple days later he called he said he wants to uh he wants to screen test me for the part i couldn't believe it you tell me what he possibly saw to do that because to me it's a miracle i mean truly a miracle and i did the thing it was on tape videotape that's how far back it was and before i by the time we finished the audition i turned to uh to go and thank him and he was gone he didn't even stick around to say congratulations or was good or as bad he was gone so i figured that's it it's over and in those days when you did a a it was a much nicer time i always tried to get a look at what i had done whether it was a commercial and if they were nice enough they would let you see it and sometimes i even made a copy for myself and i had a reel going yeah they were very nice and the tape was gone he grabbed the tape and left so the point is that i thought it was finished i went home and i was painting my kitchen and he called a couple days later and said i want you to for the part i couldn't believe it i mean i still can't and you know and then i said what's next and he said well you have to talk to the to the writer i thought well that's blows that peter schaffer i mean i admire him he's a wonderful writer but he's a brit he's going to give it to a brit he should i mean of course well he didn't we got along zance liked me and it changed my life wow did you ever ask milos foreman like what he saw on you in those five minutes when he was answering the phone no because after a while after i started working on the part i realized he saw in me that i was a wonderful actor [Laughter] it's funny who knows how these things happen you know i mean it's uh it was just a no i never asked him i never questioned it no wow that's amazing i mean to this day amadeus remains one of the most highly regarded films ever while you were making it did you know you had something special you can never you can never let yourself think that way you really can't you want to believe it i knew it was a great script and i knew i was doing a pretty good job but you can't let yourself think that far ahead you really can't i find myself even now when academy awards time comes around i find myself making up acceptance speeches i mean doesn't everybody what nonsense i mean but you do it you know it's interesting in the back of your mind you want to believe it's going to make something make a splash but you stop yourself you can't you can't do that if you do that you've seen those self-conscious performances where people are saying this is an academy award winner well it ain't honey for those scenes where you're like this is my clip this is my oscars it's it's interesting to me again correct me if i'm wrong um but both you and thomas holtz you know are so active on stage you ever worked together since then have you no he's a he's a very successful producer now yeah he ended up living across the street from me here in manhattan isn't that interesting wow and we've become friends we weren't friends that for a long time because that's the way i wanted it to be when we were in prague together i lived separate from everyone else i didn't deal with the company at all i didn't think salieri would do that so i was alone for about six months but that no big deal it was it worked it was the right thing it was a distance between us that was necessary to maintain and at the same time we respected each other which i think is pretty clear in the dictation scene at the end of the movie yeah and also in weird speech you you you gave people a lot of credit in your speech which was lovely absolutely and i know obviously the film isn't a straightforward biography but you've played real people several times in your career i actually got to see him as roy cohn in angels in america you see that yeah yeah that was another good performance i must say not all my performances are wonderful by the way but you mentioned two that are that they were really good i had a problem getting that one right because i disliked that prick so much i just like roy go but boy when it worked there's another wonderful writer i mean kushner it's interesting also that i seem to play jews very well and you're not jewish syrian yeah i was raised an orthodox christian but i talked to david mamet one of his plays i did two several of his plays and he's a very serious jew you know david and i wrote to him and i said what is it about my affinity for jews david and he wrote back and said you are an honorary jew [Laughter] that's great i'm curious though i actually was going to ask if it was hard to play roy cohn because he is so despicable but also when you have existing material to draw on do you approach a role differently oh yeah you have to take advantage of that stuff when it's available i had a very little bit of a part in the the uh the cone brothers film that was it was a wonderful it's a half a day's work really and uh that's all it was but it's a very memorable line in the movie lewin davis yeah that line always gets alive but i really studied that character i worked on that man he was a real man i mean he was a real bad ass producer important producer but really that's a tough business the music business and i based him also on saul zanz who was a tough producer of amadeus and several other very good movies but he was the toughest of the tough in the toughest business which is the music business in case you don't know and yes you do take advantage of that stuff if you can the problem is if you if you find out that they are such ugly people it's hard to get past that because you really can't play someone that you simply don't like you you can't do that it it it won't live you can you can be acceptable in the performance but the only reason i discovered it really was by accident i was working on the script while i was flying to do a some work in europe when the guy sitting next to me saw the script recognize me and said you're working on roy cohn right i said yes for broadway and i'm having a hell of a time with it because i just i just don't like the prick at all and i can't get past that and he said i did a trial against that guy he was my opponent and he said i'll tell you something about him i i he was one of the brightest attorneys i ever faced and i detested him but i couldn't keep my eyes off him and i went got it here it is thank you that's all it needed i was that close but if you don't get past that thing whether it's roy cohn or whether it's whatever the reasons are when you're as an actor you know when you're not there you know when you're good and you also know when you're bad you know especially if you're doing a play because it's the first thing you think of in the morning you got to live through the whole day knowing i got to get up on the stage and be second rate have you ever been bad though [Laughter] take my word for it dear yeah sometimes you got to be bad for a while before you get good uh in some roles if you're lucky enough for them to last but when i worked i was i was hired at the last minute for to replace an actor in uh who had a bad fall or something in uh the caretaker pinter and i knew pinter because he directed me in my first broadway play i mean i knew him to say hello but he always came to visit his shows when they were done he was a very serious playmaker and uh i i had to work on the accent the cockney accent and anyhow i had to go on stage not really knowing what i was doing so for the first couple of weeks i was just awful i mean i knew it was awful and i i kept thinking maybe i'll have an accident maybe the beer will burn down maybe i'll have a heart attack anything but to do this play and in fact i became good but you have to suffer you can't quit i mean you know and peter primed when he saw he said it was a wonderful performance that was good enough for me in general how do you choose your roles is it the people involved the story the character or sort of a case-by-case basis that's funny there was that time when you just do anything that came along just give me some work baby i mean you know now it's different they're just things i just ever since the academy award the things i just don't want to do certain people i don't want to work with so i don't i mean that's a good philosophy oh well yeah if you can get away with it you know you gotta you know you do what you got to do i've done some stuff that i wasn't real proud of but it did uh i had to feed my family man i got to pay the rent uh what drives you in most though because i mean you've worked with so many amazing directors you mentioned the coen brothers and milos foreman um just over the years wes anderson you've collaborated with several times yeah how do you become part of his like sort of theater company oh you got to have good luck and i have good luck but once you're part of his family he's he won't forget this film he did before the one he's working on now i was busy with uh some something and he invited me to come to paris to be in the film if only for one day just so that i could be part of the film wow i couldn't make it i couldn't go but he doesn't forget but that's the kind of man he is the kone brothers are that way too they really are loyal i've done quite a few of ethan's plays and uh how how were his never mind never mind so he's uh we we get along well what do you do quest by the way has the same kind of feeling of family and atmosphere as wes anderson creates and as the kong brothers insist on because it's more than just the work which is always excellent as you know but also they care for each other and they hire not only the people to in the cast who are right and who like each other but they cast the crew really also with that in mind they make sure that they are good people as well as excellent at their work but that have can can fit into the family this uh this mythic quest is as close to the atmosphere of a play that i've ever been on i actually really want to talk about your working comedy because you're such a respected dramatic actor but i remember so many hilarious performances i'm i'm obsessed with your appearance on curb your enthusiasm um where you get to rap as the ayatollah how did mythic quest come to you yeah that's a mystery but apparently the the rob uh must have seen that uh no matter how heavy my characters are there's always a twinkle i thought uh i thought salieri was pretty funny i thought he was a real funny character but uh it was a it was uh a little present from god's when he said i'd like you to be in this in this series because no one thinks of me for comedy and i love it i i think it's nothing but i'd love to make people laugh and my character in mythic quest is pretty funny how did the curb your enthusiasm appearance come about and what was it like i don't know maybe someone knew that i was partly arabic probably syrian or that i could sing and dance but uh that is a show you gotta if you can possibly visit that set you wouldn't believe how they can possibly turn out the stuff they turn out because there's no rehearsal baby you got a few bare lines and then it's like shoot the rehearsal he's there's another genius i think i hate to toss that word around but how else do you account for him doing all that he does successfully but it's funny of you you're with a bunch of people and you don't know what's going to come out next and you get up there and you do it there's a guy with a camera right in your face okay do it and then he'll he'll say all right so got it uh keep this keep that throw that out do it again try this boom shoot amazing it was on man except for the dance stuff that took a lot of rehearsal because i'm not a dancer yeah and i really wanted to get it right you know yeah you know the the musical within the episode of kirby enthusiasm is really good yeah yeah i'd like to see it yeah yeah and it's a good song pretty good people too in that show yeah i mean mr miranda lynn miranda what a treat we go back anyhow yeah it's a good business when it's good and when it's bad it's rotten it slips yeah i mean how do you sort of pull yourself out of the rotten times because it is a really hard business and you work you work don't you don't you don't sit around you don't drink you don't take a lot of drugs man i know i do some of that but what doesn't doesn't doesn't work you work you work out physical stuff get out of your head read study and have a good time let's let's let's not forget that part i think some of us take ourselves far too seriously i mean thinking about having to curb your enthusiasm and suddenly having to improvise it makes me wonder are you still learning new things about acting even at this point in your career yeah yeah i just learned something recently that it was really hard to take it was a picture that i i don't watch myself too often i like i i watch little of some of it to see how it how it turned out that's all but it's hard to watch my you have to watch yourself to learn and there was a movie i made some years ago that uh with some pretty good people in it but i knew the director was rotten so i thought it was going to be a bad picture and i was right it failed but only recently it was remastered and they sent me a copy yesterday as a matter of fact and there was one particular scene in it that i was really proud of and i looked for it and i saw it and it wasn't as good as i remember really really so so i frankly i learned something from that because some of the stuff in the flick that i didn't care too much about was kind of pedestrian was pretty good and i'm trying to figure out now what that indicates i could have been just simply pushing thinking this is going to be a really good scene this is going to be memorable and great maybe that's what i was doing so yes i'm still learning still have obviously have something to learn [Music] i mean by the way that's why you do the great roles that's why you try something complete like that's why you do lear that's why you do richard third that's why you do othello that's why you do those parts that you think are beyond you how else are you gonna find out who you are i mean how else are you going to test yourself if you don't test yourself about against the greatest who ever lived i feel that strongly uh speaking about shakespeare because you just named three iconic shakespeare roles i know um in 2005 you published a midsummer's night dream actors on shakespeare it was sort of about your experience playing bottom yeah um which i think you have said is one of your favorite roles oh absolutely what is it about that part oh gee it's an actor's dream that's one thing he's an actor he's like me it's the kind of acting i like best have you seen mark rylance when he does something like le the bet i mean he was outrageous but that's a bottom that's what bottom would do anything but that reminds me also of some of the roles i've done for terence mcnally uh uh have you seen the rich oh yes oh yeah i mean i haven't seen you in it but i've seen the reds there's a movie and um that's right yeah with richard lester has directed it but it's uh that that character i played is right out there and he's just as wild and outrageous as in his own way uh as uh as bottom was i it's it's my favorite kind of work it's why i like the opera i like the size of it and i i'm hoping that when the theater comes back and it will come back people don't misrepresent the theater for what it seems to be becoming which is a stepping stone for a television or movie production because if they do that if they write a play with that in mind the play shrinks to the size of a screen [Music] rather than expanding to the size of a greek tragedy or to a shakespearean gesture or to opera an operatic size something bigger than life i i'm hoping the theater will re-examine that are you anxious to get back on stage [Laughter] i i can't wait i did quite a bit of the mythic quest via zoom oh really yeah i was kept out here while they worked out there for half the season uh because i'm 81 and they kept thinking we don't want to risk mr abraham he's an old guy well i'm you know i'm i'm old but i'm tough anyhow uh the um the thing i discovered when i was doing the zoom acting with my my colleagues that i really like so much i think it comes across through the screen how much this company likes each other i'm pretty sure it does oh yeah do but uh what i discovered while i was doing it was that i physically need to get up in front of a bunch of people physically have to be there and i didn't know that it was that strong it was that visceral i knew i loved it blah blah blah and i enjoy it but not that i longed for it because i was doing the acting but not on stage so yes i miss it and i can't wait to get back i've been offered a broadway show now just two days ago really yes and we're going to they're looking to do it late in late fall but we will tour first and we're coming to la with it fantastic are you sorry it's not a comedy which we could use right now but it's it's heavy it's really heavy are you definitely doing it or something you're considering something we're negotiating right now amazing i would love to see you back in la where it all began yeah theater corner theater on la cienega yeah i love coronet that's where we opened wow oh my gosh and it's still there yep yeah yeah um i one of the things that i love but i also sort of dread about the experience of live theater is anything can happen having been on stage for so many years um you know have you ever forgotten your lines have things gone wrong how do you deal with it have i ever forgotten my lines how many times have i been opening night turned to my colleague and said what's my first line i don't think i think that every actor's gone through that that's not your job your first line you're supposed to be in the moment yeah but what's my first line i get to a point after uh so many years and it's happened a couple of times i'm sorry to say where i stop and i'll say i'm lost so you wait for the prompter i i'm not shy about that but i it doesn't happen often when it does it's a terrible feeling the actor's nightmare not knowing your lines you know give me a break sure but it happens it's one of the reasons it's uh it's so thrilling so you improvise improvising shakespeare it's not easy [Laughter] no it's not but it's fun well and audiences will let you know in real time if they're enjoying what you're doing as well that's another thing that intimidates me that's another thing that excites me yeah yeah it keeps you on your toes i'm able when people if someone has a very large loud sneeze in the audience i instantly say bless you i mean what the hell you know we can't ignore it it's like ignoring a wolf walking along this anyhow uh other actors don't like me to do that but that's too bad what do you do if a cellphone goes off oh that's another story gee god i've been on stage with some actors who really don't it goes on it rings it rings and one friend of mine doing a show a couple years ago said uh you want to get that yeah shoot it always happens oh no i saw something fairly recently where an amber alert kept going off oh theater and it was a very like quiet serious play and the lead actor nia vardalos actually like incorporated it pretty brilliantly into the script oh good it makes me wonder um having played so many roles in so many different genres and so many different mediums what has been your most challenging role i think as hard as lear may have been i think macbeth was tough macbeth was tough [Music] yeah macbeth is not engineered as well as as lear is because it's it's unrelenting and if you're going to do the play properly i think you can't do no intermission the whole it's about not sleeping there's no sleep in this play and it's got to go like a rocket and it takes a great deal of energy and i i there were some things in it that i did well but i never really accomplished that role there are things i did well in lear too but i i didn't i can't say i accomplished that role either i i'm not that vain to think i did but i was interesting oh by the way for my lear uh the second time i did it was here in town and uh i got the very best and the very worst reviews of my life really same performance interesting eh really so i choose to believe the best one of course you know of course but that were they there on the same night i wonder i don't know but i do know that uh you like to say that you'd ignore them but it's hard to ignore them well i lived near where i was doing it at downtown at the public theater i don't live that far so the day that the reviews came out the morning after opening night uh the phone doesn't ring when the reviews are not very good and my phone was not ringing baby so on my way to work walking to work some stranger like he comes up and he says did you read what so-and-so said about you i said no i i don't read the reviews for at least a couple of weeks he said boy he really doesn't like you thank you now i gotta go do the show yeah wow um so what i mean you had to do the show you got it the show do you ever find yourself reading criticism and agreeing with it well i wait for a while after i do it a couple of times but de niro said that you can learn something from the from a critic if they're any good you know if they're not just being nasty bums or or ignorant but i agree with him you you can you can you can be instructed in many many ways and it's possible that a critic can help you out i don't know how many good critics there are around now frankly that's the problem you know uh so i could say yes or no i mean you want to look at read them for to see a compliment you know you really do you want to you want to but you want to be instructed as well when i did the merchant of venice and i did it like i did it in uh in rep with the jew of malta by the way but when i did the merchant i got probably the best review of my life uh for that performance from the same critic who said about my lear abraham kills the king [Music] so so you see he learned a lot between that time and this time or or i did but the point is uh that review when it came because we were going to take that on tour it's the one you saw at the broad yeah yeah in santa monica where my wife went to school by the way before she went to ucla but anyhow uh when that review came out my close friend julian schlossberg the producer said well murray your tour is set i said what do you mean i said murray don't you realize this is the new york times everybody in the country reads the new york times and we were sold out for tyrod in every city we went to because of the new york times so yeah you do read them they are very important especially the new york times the flip side to that though is i remember robin williams talking about the waiting for godot that you did and how they were getting huge laughs and it was doing so well and then the reviews came out and the audience stopped laughing well they stopped laughing for a little while but not always really so well they yeah he was uh he's one of the most god rest his soul he was one of the most wonderful men i ever knew he was really a wonderful soul anyway they they really tore into that play i did pretty well and so did bill irwin and uh lucas haas the young man he was he was marvelous he was unintimidated by any of these he's a he's a remarkable actor i think lucas uh bill irwin's recent one-man show he talks he actually shows a clip from that play yeah about it yeah yeah it's um i think it is it built irwin on beckett or maybe it's just called on beckett can i can i see it is it on youtube do you think i don't know he did it out here in l.a about two years ago oh i'm sorry i didn't see it damn it i think he brings it back though he's always you know retooling and bringing stuff back and he's he's a good guy really good guy amazing i'm so glad to say these nice things about people i don't say that i mean i don't say about everybody i won't i don't know that company was not i mean steve martin was terrific we all got along so well mike was great everything was fine uh it's just that the reviews are not very good you know my oscar appears in in every play i've ever done you know that don't you what no no i knew it appeared in like like i didn't know that that was yours how how do you do that i hide it i don't let the audience see it it's for the it's for the actors to see they discover it in every play i've ever done and in godot he was buried up to his neck in the sand you could just see his little head pink but you but on say i give it to the stage managers and and they uh they hide it in trash cans in drawers and people they hang it from the ceiling and the wardrobe people make costumes for him that is so cool a little tutu i did something called uh someone made a gopher costume someone made a surfing bum outfit with a i mean the sunglasses and this it was they love him that's amazing here and in italy as well when i work there and then london he always travels and he makes an appearance he said my dear he has made my life so much easier it's been every actor should win one i mean it's just wonderful what a great idea too rather than just keeping him on a shelf that wants to perform i i owe him big time this wonderful house i'm living in right now lower fifth avenue are you kidding i wouldn't be here if it were for the oscar you know when you mentioned earlier that someone stopped you on the street and said you know have you seen the reviews i wonder uh what do people want to talk to you about most is it homeland because i know that that was you know such a fascinating character is it still amadeus i tell you homeland was a real phenomenon because it was worldwide for one thing and new york is a big tourist center and i'd be walking outside my door this is a tourist area by the way where i live and well the whole city is actually and people would say oh with these strange accents and it's it's it's astonishing how wide it is but uh the people in new york i think you'd be surprised how many people still can quote from scarface yes which i made at the same time as amadeus you know that right right yeah simultaneously yeah flying from prague to hollywood back and forth it was uh and they came out about the same time but uh it's the people who like scarface who would surprise you they're not necessarily just working class people there's people in suits briefcases quoting from it loving it and the other people like there's a there's a trash a guy who collects the trash on our street who loves amadeus just every time we see each other he stops to say hello and quotes a few lines i mean it's remarkable amazing amazing film well right now you're in like one of the top movies on netflix things seen and heard i don't know if you're getting a lot of reaction from that people really yeah isn't that interesting yeah a couple of brooklynites made that film that was fun some good actors in that play really good actors some really good performances yeah it's true of mythic quest too some very good actors yeah i've been very lucky i continue to have good luck i mean is there anything you haven't played that you want to play any kind of a role do you want to do lear again yeah one more time got to be a cut down version though but i want to do lyra and i want to do i'm going to do more comedy there's a bit that i did from ethan cone's play it's only an evening where i played the uh old testament god it's a it's a two and a half three-page monologue which is really hysterically funny that i do from time to time for fundraisers it's pretty foul but it's pretty wonderful funny and uh i've been offered the chance the next time i come out to la to do it as part of a stand-up at the coronet theater oh wow yeah so good you'll come and see it absolutely were you going to do that before the pandemic i was going to do it when i was out there doing um what was i working on when i was working on oh gosh it's all running together well old mind let's see i was doing something out there for a while and uh i was invited to do some stand-up oh i know what it was it was the larry david show oh it was curve okay yeah yeah and oh god forgive me what's the name of the character who plays okay who's on that show and he's also on the goldbergs jeff garland runs that monday night stand up he does he invited me to come and and do it and then something happened and i had to leave and the pandemic but when i go out there next time he promises that there's going to find a spot for me i really love doing it it's so much fun i feel like i literally had it on my calendar a year ago for for like late february or march right before the shutdown almost next time i'll get to see it this year hopefully well again i want to thank you so much for joining us today thank you for sharing your experiences and your craft it has been such a joy um people can catch you now on mythic quest on apple tv plus netflix in the film and you know hopefully we'll be seeing you in more and more comedies thank you very much thank you so much for joining us it's a pleasure you

Channel: SAG-AFTRA Foundation

Views: 2,275

Rating: 5 out of 5

Keywords: SAG Foundation, SAG-AFTRA Foundation, Acting, Actors, Q&A, Interview, F. Murray Abraham, Career Conversations, Conversations at Home, Jenelle Riley

Id: 3A2qLjKj4qc

Length: 58min 37sec (3517 seconds)

Published: Wed May 19 2021