Dick Cavett on Fame, George Harrison and The Worst Interview He Ever Did

he's considered one of the greatest talk show hosts ever ladies and gentlemen from the 60s through the 80s his interviews with celebrities ranging from gore Vidal to Jimi Hendrix were and are renowned for their humor and their intelligence The Onion AV Club recently said he quote proved good conversation makes good television just this year as talk shows were made available on CBS's channel called decades he also was a regular columnist for The New York Times and has published several books we've had the pleasure of having him on the show a couple times in the past ladies and gentlemen please welcome mr. Dick Cavett for those of you at home dick cavett just beat me at arm wrestling it was kind of like at one of my credits oh really probes came in second in a Jessica Williams look-alike is that right that's right that's right that seems unlikely but all right proud moment just held that by a dynamite yeah Sony probably still is ah hey I love what you've done with the place hey it's pretty good wait uh what was it beforehand was that here years ago yeah deadly I'm not in this sick same spot was it no no I don't know I don't know what no EE C was not into the same spike okay so your audience is thrilled to know that that's right that's so obvious we last talked with you you played yourself in the off do you remember this you know relate yourself you know everything the off-broadway production Helmand be McCarthy which is about a libel lawsuit the began your late night show tell us about playing yourself how do I get a cent well I'll give a little background though it's an elaborately long story but two great famous American writers Mary McCarthy and Lillian Hellman were friends once but things developed over the years and miss McCarthy on a show of mine decided to point out several things about Miss Hellman yes yeah and she said that the most memorable thing she said about it was she's such a dishonest writer that even her those and and our lives yeah yes now miss Hillman did not agree neither did her lawyers yeah what's it either did her lawyers know and in fact you know way too much but I got a call the next morning why didn't you defend me and I said well Lillian you don't ever seem like someone who needs defending yeah kicked here yourself and and in a humorous mood she sued me and PBS and who else she see suit at least three different parties yeah everyone but you play no of course on Miss Mary and Mary now Lillian this great writer this old bag had a mountain of wealth that she sat on because she shared the sack with Dashiell Hammett for many years and got a lot of money that way I apparently got all of his inheritance stuff so she was picking on people who were not quite so financially able but anyway it was a bitter thing it was a long lawsuit it played all over the papers and the news in the world of literature and so this play evolved from that and it it was really a gripping play and one of the characters was named dick cab and the two ladies and it's a strange feeling playing yourself how do you play yourself you can be yourself that's not easy either in stage but to play yourself the sad part is I wasn't the first choice for the room Oh am i what was it what was the hardest part of yourself to play do you think from the legs down oh I didn't understand the quick body level whatever whatever yeah what the hell did that mean I don't know I think would you like some apple juice yeah I think he may have had some not sure and anything else you've got oh but I love doing the play I stayed on after the boughs and schmoozed with the audience and had a great great time doing it of course since we're talking about your acting you weren't you were an actor and a writer first and then you still are obviously and then at a certain point your career became kind of mainly about talking with other actors and writers tell us about that decision if it was a decision that you know you know it wasn't a decision really when I was looking back on it of all the things I ever wanted to be a talk-show host was not among them hmm I wanted to be famous isn't that sickening hmm and we are sitting in Nebraska figuring how to be famous mm-hmm but actually I met a lot of show people in Lincoln Nebraska Bob Hope is bad in the paper Bob Hope you know the twenty-eighth that I thought it's a film and a little friend of mine and I went to this huge Coliseum it filled up and it was a whole active variety actually thought I see it's a intermission we go back and now the star of our show Bob Hope I doubt that out uh and Bob Hope glided out on the stage with that great walk where my friend said Jesus there is and he was right there but we didn't believe we would see yeah I ran around in my already pushy way to the stage door steps the guy after the show and Bob Hope came hi dusta Bob joined the Peace Corps hope came down the steps and I said fine show Bob and he said thanks son next day at school I told all my friends I'd been hanging out with Bob oh so you were but as young age you were made for this job pretty much that's right but years later I'm looking backstage thinking his Bob Hope standing there because he's one of the guests today but I have to be sure he's there and then when he came out I told him that story fine show Bob but he said was that you never forgot it yeah great memory great moment in Bob's life so we want to play a clip that we think illustrates the pros and cons of being a host okay and it's from your 1971 interview with George Harrison are there more pros than cons here yeah we'll talk about it afterward yeah yes I think it's better being me than you right now but um uh one is all right sir you're interviewing George Harrison he's one of the biggest stars in the world making a rare TV appearance and he's promoting a film about Indian music called raga okay I'll take your word and and the Beatles have broken up but a few minutes into the interview you ask him about John Lennon and we're gonna awesome clip now are you in any sense in contact with each other I mean I saw him last night actually at the premiere of raga which is what we should talk about maybe okay but I mean what did you say I said hi hello and you have writers who think of these things or you just have them ready because you snappin right out here we have writers home and their winds full of them where did he come back with right with hi patchy this ought to be a was there more did that before it's pretty got real boring people you know to talk to on the show I'm probably the biggest boy I've ever had on the show really mm-hmm you think yeah well I'll be the judges oh listen I'll tell you well I don't really you know they asked me do you want to come on the Dick Cavett show and I said yeah I got nothing to talk about really yeah I still think of something you know anything so I thought okay we're going to talk about ragga which is film mmm you mean that's it when we're done talking about that then then I go you don't like to talk then well not really sometimes if there's something to say but there's really nothing to say these days oh my god ha ha nightmare yeah nightmare fact is for those who don't have him detailed memory of that show I had had John and Yoko on and and and then Harrison and people said you shouldn't try to do a 90-minute show with Harrison lots of luck but some of it was like that and then it got better and better and better as the show went on and that's one of the arguments for long show is many guests in the 7 minutes they mostly get today aren't warmed up yet well we got to say goodbye to you dick good talking to you time we have for today wait a minute I'll be the judges I later in that show I just forgotten this it struck me that the Lennon's had been there a couple weeks before so I said to Harrison I'll have to move this slightly I said to him you know Yoko sat in that chair you're in now yeah it was not cool it was not cool I should have said oh not that Yoko what it so what in that moment who are you thinking of are you thinking of your your you know your fragile ego saving you know defending yourself you're thinking of the guest making him more comfortable are you thinking of the audience thinking of what the audience perhaps which of the three that the best thing you can do is and it sounds so silly try to listen to what the guest is saying that's right when I first did the show I thought what a nightmare I'm going out there to do 90 minutes of television improvised and I don't know when to throw to commercial and I don't know what's going on and oh my god I'm talking to this guest here but somebody their letter to sign and they took it away before I saw it and maybe I'm supposed to be in a commercial now and and you look over at the guest and the guests lips have stopped moving oh my god and you have no idea what you were talking about what they were talking about and it's really scary a lady producer I had said when that happens shield she said I should have warned you about it have a sentence a question that will fit anybody at a time like that and what sir what was your go-to well she suggested do you pee in the shower that's so crazy that's our next question that's weird well we'll see about I believe a bit that well next time it happened it didn't go over so well with Averell Harriman Google that young folks I don't have time for you but I got I have to say you know I watched that clip Harrison's a hero of mine probably of a lot of people in the room and it starts you know it gives me at least in that moment it gives me sort of a bad opinion of them do you remember a guest on the show you were really looking forward to having on the show maybe a hero who let you down oh yes my god I couldn't sleep the night before spiro agnew came at last that's right yeah pictures all over my wall pletely yeah he was the dullest guest ever rise that's good let's put an ever on that and people said his handlers this is in the early in the Nixon administration and which Woody Allen said he was going to sleep through and I I just didn't know what to expect and they said well we're putting up some cartoons of him he's always being politically cartooned by the great herb block and others and he'll have funny things to say about them someone failed to give them to him and I said what about this one is hmm is that a new one no those were the highlights but does he pee in the shower yeah no but I'll tell you something it might surprise you I have the anagram curse I rearranged letters in a word in my head lightning speed nobody knows what it's a weird craziness I once saw Alec Guinness on a marquee and thought genuine class Wow and it is I mean and the tragedy is the Agnew left one week before I realized that Spiro Agnew is grow a penis all right we were gonna ask you later to tell us something we don't know yeah no need

Channel: The Greene Space at WNYC & WQXR

Views: 1,495,065

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Keywords: dick cavett, the beatles, television, podcast, dinner party download, wnyc, the greene space

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Length: 14min 9sec (849 seconds)

Published: Thu Apr 21 2016