Elliott Gould: Mash Notes on a Long Career

Turner Classic Movie Film Festival this past April. Before our conversation, we watched a clip reel of his films, which included Mash Bob and Carroll and Ted an Alice and The Long Goodbye, some of the most iconic films of the past forty years. Elliott Gould's career spans six decades, and unlike many of his peers, he's worked consistently from the start. Both his career and personal life are full of dramatic

twists and turns. A marriage to Barbra streisand working with Carrie Rand and George Clooney, a gambling addiction, a role on the sitcom Friends. There's almost too much to talk about. Where the hell do I begin? Oh my god, Now you started in the theater in New York. I started in uh sort of vaudeville. I played the Palace in ninety one when I was twelve doing what part of Somebody's act? I was a messenger boy in the act Bill Callahan. His name was and but I followed Smith

and Dale. Smith and Dale was the act before us. They were the original Sunshine Boards. We did four shows a day, seven days a week, for two weeks. I got paid fifty bucks a week and I had the highest dressing room, right, like the fifth floor walk up dressing room. Yeah. When when you were doing that, you know, showbiz in your family? Correct, Well, that's pretty pretty funny. I think everybody here is in show business. But your parents, no,

they weren't performers. They danced. My father was a good dancer. He did a Lindy. My mother and I used to act my uh bar mitzvah. My mother and I tangoed too. I get ideas. No, no, no, that's the truth. It's pretty funny. My mother could put a chicken in the oven. Doesn't make her a chef. You know. It's like, but you pay your family wasn't in the business. They weren't.

And when you would when you finished, uh not finished, when you moved on from vaudeville, what was your first Broadway or off Broadway show you did, was it I Can get It for your wholesale? Was your from? No? No, no no. I got a job in a summer stock production of Annie Get Your Gun with Von Monroe. Do you remember the name? And uh? But we were going to be at a place a tent called Brandywine someplace, uh, on this coast, and there was a storm and it blew away. So I never got to be to do

the show. And then I got a job for a segment of the Ernie Kovacs Show with fifty other male dancers. I was primarily a dancer, and Ernie Kovacs was great. And then my first Broadway musical was called Rumpel, which was directed by Jack Donahue and starred Eddie Foyd Jr. Gretchen Wiler, and Stephen Douglas. So singing and dancing was primary for you in the beginning, and then later on did you come back and we visit that in other projects you've done? I mean other than I never really

had an act. We would go to the Catskill Mountains as paying customers, and on Sunday nights they would have me do what I did on Saturday night. I do a couple of routines, you know, But in the films, you never sat there and said I'd like to do a musical in doing your there had been talked of it. I never did it. But Jimmy conn and I did a picture called Harry and Walter Go to New York and we we we did a whole number in the beginning, which was written by Marilyn and Alan Bergman, which is

nobody's perfect. The uh, I can get it for you wholesale. Obviously, you meet your first wife. Then well, my first girlfriend, your first girlfriend. Let's tell us all about that, tell us all about the oh stupid, but you met she was your first girlfriend. Well, for we had to cast the role that I played. Once they cast this part, then they had all the finalists come in to audition and with me being there for them to see how

I felt about them. And Barbara auditioned for my secretary called miss Marmelstein beyond brilliant, just so amazing, and she sang three or four songs and then her song. And Jerome Wideman, who had written the book and it had been a picture a movie before, we did the musical, and Susan Hayward played my part, and Dan Daily was in it too, and Jerome Wideman said to me, what do you think. I said, she's brilliant, and she presents herself sort of like the way I think about myself.

She's scared and she's hiding behind things. And I called her because she announced her number. And then, uh, she said, I'm singing tonight, come and see me. I said, I think you're going to be in the show. And once you're in the show, we can see if we get to know one another. Is that when she really really took off during that No, oh no, no, she she's you would say that she stole the show. It was

the best thing in the show. Uh. And and then she this was just prior to her first album, and she had done a Jack Parr show, and she had done a few talk shows. And her career is, as we all know, amazing, and she's just one of a kind and brilliant. She certainly has. Your first film, you tell me, was with Dieterley, was with William Dieterley. Yes, your first film? Described that film? What was the film?

The film at the time was called The Confession and it was going to be shot on the island of Jamaica at the same time that Dr No was being done, and also High Wind in Jamaica that Alexander McKendrick did with Anthony Quinn. And I went in and they asked me to play a part called Alessandro, who was a death mute. And the picture was starring Ginger Rogers, my first star, and h and Raymond Land and William Diechley

was directing it and I was a death mute. And at the end of the picture, I get shocked into sang a hearing. I wonder what was it like for you to go from vaudeville and theater in New York and to do your first film. When you were making your first film, did you say yous of oh this is it? Because I as you and I bought other people who come on and they're like them. They were born on a sound stage in Hollywood, and it took

me three films to find the camera. The first first film, and I know you understand this was William Dicholi, who had directed Charles Lawton as the Hunchback of Notre Dame Beautiful film and Paul Muni as a bunch of stuff that he did, and um, he was calling me Nugent, Nugent. There was an Elliott Nugent, so in his mind, I was at Elliott Nugent. Doesn't matter to me. I don't care who anyone is, you know, And I call you nugent, call me anything, I'll give you a better name than that.

So so you he kept calling you nugent when when you were there was did you sit there and say, oh, I don't have it. I don't know if I have what it takes to make films or no. No, I mean I had no experience. I remember one Sunday there was an actor's on a benefit of Hamlet with h Richard Burton, and I wanted to see it, and Barbara was here in New York, and I want and I came back, which was more than naughty and not supposed to leave. I left the island to come to see that.

And I got back and Ginger Rogers and her husband said no, no, that's no. I said, okay, I really wanted to see it, you know, and I had a really good tan. I wanted to proper to see my tan also. Uh. But in this scene where my character is shocked because everyone's looking for treasure and the treasure is inside of a statue nobody and it sort of falls, and so I'm shocked into and I didn't know what

to do. And I went to see digitally there with about five thirty in the late afternoon, early evening, and I said, do you have a thought for me or what to do? And he said, then I did act the Lawton in Hunchback of Notre Dame. He went and then he went and his wife, who was always there, and she said, he's sleep now, because the next day I did it. And I blew myself out in in the rehearsal because I was more than insecure. I mean, you know, I took a deep breath, but you got

to do it over and over and over again. So on a Richter scale, in the first picture, I was zero. I wasn't below it or I wasn't above it. I just did it and got through it. Remember, because I remember the same thing I did a TV show years ago. You don't want to be caught with your pants down energy wise. I don't want to be dull, so I

would over invest and mellow dramatize things I did. I did a TV show and the character uh, a woman was a benefactress of a medical center and she was going to withdraw all her funding of the medical center because she didn't appreciate some of the work we were doing.

And I have a scene with her work in front of her, and when they rolled the camera, I was like, you know, you don't I stand it was this place, would like I'm sobbing, and the directors like, whoa, we got another We got another forty minutes to go here. I mean, but in things I've read about whether you said this yourself or not, or what was said about you, was it Working with Altman was a big seminal thank for you that he helped you to open up. And

he gave me so much space. I mean. Prior to working with Bob, I had made a second film that Billy Freakin did the night they rated Minsky's, and I played the last scene that Bert lar Ever did. And now that I have an idea of how to breathe from the first film, now I'm playing the title role in the Night they rated Minsky's. But I had no idea about light or a camera and Bert Laar this is his his last scene because he didn't finish the picture.

He passed away, and I would be taking a position and putting his shadow on me, and and he would be adjusting and we'd be moving, but the camera had to be stationary. And we did it over and over and over again, and and Bert Laura brought me home that night. He had an apartment of Park Avenue, and he said to his life, look what I brought with me. That was Burt laura third film, Paul Masserski's first film,

and Bob and Carol and Ted and Alice. I discovered my first objective relationship in life and existence with the camera. I realized that the camera doesn't give me problems. I give me problems. The camera will never lie to me and will never manipulate me. So we were all set up, we had always many people as are in the room,

and then we had to break for union regulations. I think we're both unionists, but we had to break, and so I had no place to go as usual, and they turned the lights down and left the set there, and I just sat there. And that's when I got it. That's when I got it. So when I went back to New York to start to do a show play that Alan Schneider, who had directed the original Virginia Wolf,

they replaced him, and then they replaced me. But I had found my relationship with the camera and and so I came out to Los Angeles and was asked to meet Bob Altman, and Bob Altman gave me the script to mash and he asked me to read it. And I came in and he said, would you consider playing the American Southerner? I said, I've never questioned an offer, but I'll be so intense and drive myself crazy validating

me as an American Southerner. But this guy, if you haven't cast Trapper John, I got the juice for that. I know, I know what that guy has. And it's like he let me cast myself. And when you did Bob and Carroll? What was that film like for you to shoot and Carroll? Yes? How was Missoursky as a director? Great? Uh? I was incredibly insecure and frightened about the the sexual part of it. I really didn't have very much confidence. But then Larry Tucker and Paul Missourski, they were partners.

They wrote it and they had improvised the bedroom scene, the scene with the Diane Cannon and me, and it was funny. It was just so so right. So I was able to do that. And with Missouriski, the thing in there when he goes that I don't know what to do? That was that was for real. I asked him if I could do that. He said, do anything that that you want. It's funny when you do sex scenes and films you had an issue with doing you

didn't feel confident. Why well, how well, we didn't really do anything even when we were in bed, even the idea where I had a prepping brushing my teeth, gargling, you know, and putting deodor into on. I mean a lot of us are like that, weren't you? Sure? Yeah,

I was so nervous every time. I'm nervous. Um. But the but but I'm saying, as you say, you lacked confidence, and then, uh, I lacked confidence in me and I had a very little experience and therefore at that point to exhibit or be as as transparent as I am. I have a lot of experience now in the work, you know, in life. So I understand, I'm I'm in balance.

But but for me, when I look at me, I'm in the clip real obviously, just as a as a guide to this, it's eventually become someone who's supremely confident in front of the camera. You know, you really have a great with it. Yeah, well I've worked for George. You know it's more than it's maturing. I mean even after uh working within Mark Berkman, which was like you know beyond uh you know to work. This is a business and uh, it's a business that's driven by the audience.

And and you know this and I didn't always know it. Uh you know who Jerry West is? Right, So I said too, we're friendly. And I've said I always thought it was about talent, but now I believe it's about character. You can be born with talent, but character is something that we have to develop through experience, through education. And he educated me in a moment, Jerry did, because on this level, you have to be talented, but I mean, nobody can teach you character. You have to have character.

You have to know and I didn't have perspective and I didn't have judgment, and so I had to put myself through a lot of stuff. But I never gave in and never gave up. But still you've got to be employed. In order to gain this experience. You've got to work. I mean, I I the older I get, and the more I have done this, the more technical it becomes. To me, you either you have the inspiration

or you don't. Well, that's nature. What I've recently discovered is that what's true and what's real is not necessarily the same. And to me, I can only talk for myself. What's true is what you feel. Nature is true, what's real. Sometimes we invent what's real, and I have found that the corporate intelligence will build on that and it can be misleading to us. As far as being alive in

everything we do, sometimes we have to be technical. I've done some work where I said, it's very difficult for me not to be natural, so let me make my mistakes. I'll I'll make several mistakes over and over again until I can master that and do it because being dependable and being reliable is the basis of of of the work. I found that the you know for me, the longer longer I've done it in my life. The thing I've fantasized about is to have worked with great directors. And

you worked with a lot of great directors. What do you think Almen hired you for? What did he see in you? We're gonna be out of time very soon. No no no, no no no. It's a possibly an energy and energy which was necessary because I mean we that was the first of quite a few opportunities that we had to work together. So I don't quite know what Bob necessarily saw in me, but I was able to get past myself and express myself and free myself to do what he was doing. I never worked like

that before. I was a chorus boy, a tap dancer, a real good tapp answer. And so I said, I understand repetition, and I understand precision, and we'll do it until you're satisfied. Robert Altman he published me first as his enemy because I I was always wanting things to be prepared and to know what the next. But in life, you don't know what's next. And I've seen and learned through Bob that his work, that Altman's work, uh is about life taking its course, which to me is the

most interesting thing. Aldman said that I was the most h honest actor that he that he knew. Nichols said that about about Nicholson. I said, why did you love Nicholson? Because he had no vanity? You know, when he when he let himself go, when he was kind of a little rounder, and he did terms of endearment and he lays on the bed and pats the bed. For surely McLean's has come on up here, come on up here.

We're friendly. Jackie. I like to call him Jackie, you know, or do you really Yeah, Jackie, I want to call you a b I love it. I love it well. Nicholson whether we talked about directors, if I did this little survey of for HBO about Ken, we interviewed Polanski, and later on I saw Nicholson and I couldn't help but ask him, you know, what was it like to do China Temper was like to be directed by Polanski? And Nicholson said that to be on the set with

Houston and Polanski. So Houston is in the one of the greatest directors of all time is acting in the film, and polanskys there. Nicholson said that Houston called him Roman. We called him Roman, and he studied, tourned him and said, now Roman really only two directions, a little more and a little less like Boy. It seemed to have served him pretty well. You know. It was a lot of

a people who don't know. But when you see mash I mean, the two of you are so Donald was such, you know, he was cast before me and Bob Altman asked me to have lunch with him once we set me and the commissary at Fox, and it was just me and Donald at lunch. And my first sense was I didn't think he liked me. I thought, whatever, you know, but we we got a long grade and we we stayed together, Donald and me, Bob and everyone. I wouldn't look at any film. I wouldn't look at any dailies.

I don't want to fall in love with anything. It's it's just work and getting it, and we did. We did three films together. Donald was it was what was mash because of that a live quality, that immediacy to it that I see whenever I see that film. Is it a lot of it was a lot of improvisation? Was it all written down or most of it written down? Well?

When we showed Ring Lardner Jr. The film Uh at Fox with the cast there, and I probably I may have already seen it, and I was showing Donald how to play against the wall like with a spaldine, like you know, a street game with a ball and pretend to be baseball. And that was the night that lou al Cinder was playing against Will Chamberlain and and the picture had been shown and we were there on the back lot and ring Lardner walked up to me and I thought, what are you talking to me? It's not

my picture? And uh he said, you know, how could you do this to me? There's not a word that I wrote on screen? And ring Lardner went on to win the Academy Award that year for the Best Screen. I think that ring Lardner now, when he asked you to come to uh the marlaw was aftermash the director who we thought was going to do it. Another director couldn't see me in it, and and I was thinking in terms of uh Lee Marvin, the great Lee Marvin,

and Robert Mitchum, the great Robert Mitchum. And I said, well, I mean, I can't argue with them. They're like my uncle's. But we've seen them. You haven't seen me. But and then they gave it to Bob and Bob called me from Ireland where he was finishing images, and he said to me, what do you think? And I said, I've always wanted to play this guy. And Bob said, you are this guy and that was the beginning of the picture.

What was the specific challenge for you to do that film? Because, like a lot of people, we'll say to you if you're reprising a role that other people have their fingerprints on. I did street Car on Broadway and people always like, well, what about you know? You know? And I was like, Okay, if you want to see the show live on Broadway tonight, I'm it. He's not here, right yeah, right right, He's up on Mulholland Drive right now, dinner. And uh, you know, I'm kind of it right now if you want to

buy a ticket. But every perception is every every job is a challenge. But when you did it, do you weren't conscious of ghosts and things like that? You know nothing. I grew up watching a bog Art, you know, and uh, I mean bog Art. It can't compare anyone to bog Art, And so I just knew it was going to be something different. And and Bob who told me I scared him in it because he gave me all of this space and I'm painting a picture, and um so and when when we tested ninav and Palant, I didn't see

her in it. I thought it would would have been somewhat a bit younger, but I knew Alman knows what he wants. So I got my wardrobe when we did the screen test for Nina van Palant, you know, a mismatched jacket and pants and a tie, which was my statement because when I go into the water into the ocean and nearly drowned that night, I have a little American flags on it which you can't even see, and I keep my shoes are on, my jack everything's on, and I just take the tie off to give to her,

which was my message to outer space. We're America, you know. So when you do California Split, are you like researching or? That was semi autobiographical, and we thought that Steve McQueen was going to play that part. Uh and uh. In the picture, the character that George Siegel plays was me and I played the character of the writer who played the bookmaker in a Joseph Walt who was a child star. So I had that experience. I knew about gambling. I

gambled how well and the and there're sports nut? You like sports? Yeah, your sports nut, So I'd have an opinion, and you know it's was being somewhat obsessively compulsive, you know, with baseball, football, basketball, not hockey so much, but at a certain point anything. And I played cards, and I don't do that anymore. Once I got through the Oceans thing, I've realized, as much as I love to win, I hate losing more. And there's nothing I need that I

can win. I've got to make it for myself. And then I realized, I thought, well, but sometimes I'll pay to play. But even now, I'd rather read a book. I'd rather give the family, give the kids the money. I don't want to. Uh. Gamble. Was there a white hot period? Few though an intense period. You did a lot of game, a big game. There was a big game which was when Alan the Horse Amici went over to beat the giants Baltimore Colts. And that game would

a three and a half point spread. So if they just kicked the field goal, we lose because we're allaying the three and a half points. And Carol Rosenbloom, who was the owner, uh and he then owned I think the Rams, and that was very big. Walsh and I. That was in the late fifties, in the late fifties, Yeah, that was terrible, terrible, just terrible. I don't want to gamble. I don't want anyone to gamble something. You've got to have an open mind to take a chance. Sometimes I

don't want to gamble. When asked if he had a drug problem on a late night talk show in Elliott Gould answered that he didn't. He had a problem with reality coming up. Googled on his relationship with Alfred Hitchcock explore the Here's the Thing Archives. I talked with Michael Douglas about what makes a great director. For Douglas, Adrian

Lyne was one of the best. I remember, you know, when Glenn and I were doing Fail Attraction and we had the scene in the kitchen the first time we were kind of going at it, got her up on the kitchen sink, and so he did it. Take on that and said, well that was that was one of the love That was just great. What could we do? I think? And glab said, well, maybe I can take the water and I can stick my wet fingers in his mouth. Lovely, lovely, lovely. Take a listen and here's

the thing. Dot Org, this is Alec Baldwin and you're listening to Here's the Thing. Elliott Gould was the first American actor to work with legendary director Ingmar Bergman. Gould was fresh off the movie Mash when Bergman approached him to work on The Touch. Gould considers the film a masterpiece. Bergman sent me the script scared the hell out of me. Made Bob and Carolinda Analis looked like Abernic Ostello to me, and uh and and so then I thought, I can't

say no to Inmar Bergman. Have him called me in the West Village Morton Street. And so he called me. No, no, little Brad, you said, I said. My hair stood up, and I thought, okay, I mean it can be rather impulsive. I said, I can trust me with him and him with me. And so I said okay, and I came across us and Uh. The first thing he said to me when I came down the elevator at the Diplomat Hotel in Stockholm, he said, my father taught me to

always be a little bit early. And so we went through everything at an office in the theater, met B. B. Anderson and Max found said and then I went away for a while, Uh, to Sorrento and to Paris. And in Paris, uh, Sam Peck and Paul wanted me to do straw Dogs and I wasn't going to be able to do it, but he called me in Paris while I was getting ready to come back to Sweden to work with Ingmark, and Sam said to me, Elliott, you

do read between the lines, don't you? And I said Sam, I lived between the lines, and until such time as I understand the lines, it's way too terrifying for me to think where I live now maybe I'm now that I'm getting it. I mean, I can see, Oh, there

are boundaries, there are limits. Because in the second week of principal photography on the Touch, which I thought could be about Larry Bird or it could be about somebody who could deal cards, I thought, yeah, he said, you've gone beyond your limits and you'll have to live more to understand what you've done. And at that moment I was secure in playing him. I play him in it. Uh and uh. But I had no confidence in me, and I didn't know any limits, and I couldn't say

stop everything. I couldn't so I had to go further. Now I come back to America and I'm resuming, resuming my producing career because it appeared that I had a very rather fertile career as a producer. I had already produced Little Murders. We had several pictures that were there, but I didn't know who I was dealing within, what I was dealing with. I had to find out. I had to find out. I went all in and I had to pay everything off. But I didn't lose this.

I didn't lose my soul. And I'm here and I'm grateful to it to everyone uh for valid aiding my work. I've done a lot of films. Some are betteran some aren't. But I could look at anyone and everyone I've ever been in and find a reason for participating. Since I'm still working, and that's the key to continue to work. There was someone acting wise, I mean you you work

with great directors and great film actors. Who was someone that before you started doing the film you were really excited to make a film with you just Oh, I I don't know if I knew anyone, uh that I had participated in a film. First film, I mean I knew Bert Law from The Cowardly Lion and he was a great, wonderful actor. And then Bob and Carroll and

Ted and Alice. You say about Natalie Wood and and that Bob cab that night it was the night, one of the nights that Richard Nixon defeated Hubert Humphrey, which was terrible, not very happy for many of us. Uh. And then with Mash, I didn't know anyone, and then there was getting straight. I didn't know anyone. I've met people and developed relationships through the through the work, and I mean I do love us, you know, I mean

each one. No one is more important, the least of us, the least the craft services, the least of us, the guy at the door. It's an all team effort. You know. Um you Uh. I've done some television in the last several years. Everybody knows you did. Uh Friends. Did you enjoy doing that? Yes? And uh, I did an episode of Friends. I was It was terrifying to me, Oh

my god. But the reason, the main reason I did it is because A. Burrows directed me and my second show, which was Say Darling, and he had directed the original production of Guys and Dollars that my parents took me to see. And Jim Burrows, who was the top director, he was directing it. And I was told because it wasn't much for me in it that Jim Burrows would kill them if they couldn't deliver me. And and so I did it, and then they did some writing for me.

And it's a very very happy experience. Yeah, um, we are going to take some questions, uh, because I know we do have some time limits and I can't see very well. So if I don't call on you, get over it. We're gonna go with this gentleman back here right were right there, you wave your hand, that's here we go. When I was brought to song and dance school at the age about nine eight or nine, that Freddy, who is the tap teacher, said you know, what do you want to do? And I thought, I mean, what

what can I say? To be a fireman? I don't think so to be a cowboy, no, that sounds weird to uh blow a trumpet and have the walls come tumbling down, a little esoteric. I don't know what to be or what to do. And you know, I'd like to play soldier. I like to be law enforcement. Jack Webb wants at me if I would be the new law enforcement person at universally was going to produce me, which was interesting. I liked talking with him, but I never could make a deal. This woman right here in

the third fourth row. If you're in the back, wave your hands, wheck and see if I see you in the backgroup, good go ahead man. That thought. Personally, what what character did you relate to the most? Uh? Well, the work I relate to just about every character. I told you with with Mash that that was the most popular thing that that I've ever done. Getting straight was really interesting, and when I fell out, uh industry wise,

which maybe we'll talk about at another time. Off off of it, I was really pleased that two of my students in it because I played a teacher. Uh. Two of my students in it were h Harrison Ford and Candis Bergen, which was good for me, you know that. And that was the picture on Time magazine that date of that cover. There were two covers in the world. The one in America here was the one that you

saw in that film. The one in Canada and in Europe was a photograph of trapper John As and just me the man from Mash which I don't want to be too proud, but my father was very proud. But I I find that a grain of pride is good for the heart, But no more than that. It's blinding. But so a character that I might have a problem with. Uh, And that if a director or a writer wants me to help to interpret it, that's very interesting to me.

But no matter what I play, I have this heart, I have a brain left some of it, and I do believe in the soul. And so I bring my life to whatever I do. And what is the film you did that on a technical level or in terms of the role and kind of getting at the way you went. What was one of the toughest ones you did. What was a hard movie for you to make? Wow? The role? No, no, I I I understand you. So no matter if I don't mean they had no hot water at the hotel, I mean the role itself. No, no, no,

I mean it's deeply personal. I have no secrets relative to that. Uh. I was friendly with Casey Afflick during the Oceans movies, but I never connected with Ben and Um and Matt Maddie. Matt Damon said Ben is the smartest person that he knows. And I said to Matt and Clooney, I guess you haven't met all of us, you know, And because we're all on and so after seeing Argo, I'm really impressed with Ben's work. I think

he's really good. And so I thought I'll go to their party and see if I can have a moment with him, and I did, and I told him how impressed I am with with your your work, your craft, your craft. And he was pleased. And then after a moment or two, he said, I have a question. Have you ever done anything in all of this that you were sorry you did afterwards? It's a really good question. I said, no, it would be so disloyal. There's so many people who are dependent on our work, and we

do everything that we can to do the best. Sometimes it doesn't work, but I wouldn't be sorry about that. One of the great things is to be vulnerable. That that's one of the things in life, to be vulnerable. What character who was most difficult? Oh, my god, working for Ingmar, I'm playing his part. That wasn't so easy. But oh, I'm so glad I can share this with you. There's a scene where, my God, the character David I think, is lying outside of a church, lying. He's not telling

the truth to B. B. Anderson's character. And I had my eyes closed because he's lying and we broke for luncheon ingmar came up to me and he said, I'll never mislead you. He said, I can't. I will never mislead you. I think that you have your eyes closed because you're afraid you can't give me what you think I want. He said, I need you. I want your eyes open because even if there's nothing there, that's what the scene is about, for me to see where I am,

which is the best direction I've ever had. Isn't that good? M y go ahead? Oh? I did that this weekend to my assistant, the assistant director of the movie that I'm participating in Now Back East, and I said, do you know the quiet man john Ford? I sometimes have been uh addressed. I've been dressed to go black tie and if it's on, I can't leave. I can't leave. I mean john Ford, john Ford, John Wayne in that marine O'Hara, Barry Fitzgerald. It's one of the most romantic

things you can ever see. And Spielberg used it in Et. You know he has it affecting all of us. Well, those movies that are like that, you know, it's funny. I use the exact same analogy. I say, a good movie you watch and you enjoy it, but you have to be in the mood for it. Sometimes I said, a great movie put you in the mood for the said how many times it was I sitting there nothing consequential, but I'd say to my wife, I'd said, oh, we need to go buy pillows today or something. I we

need new pillows or something. And I'd sit on my bed and my you know, well out of the shower, and the minute you see that marble swirling around and that cigar box, and it's the opening titles of To Kill a mocking Bird. And I'm not going anywhere, And I mean I just started sobbing and I'm crying at the titles and I'm crying at the marble. Is no, no, no one's shown screen, No one said anything. And I want to tell you a little bit about Hitchcock. I spent real so we're gonna get to you. I promised

you go ahead. So I was co hosting an award show prime time on NBC. We we finished the rehearsals and management came to me and said, Alfred Hitchcock is here to claim his award. He's got some problems with his knees. Can he sit in your room. My room was closest to the stage. I said, well, naturally. I came back to my room and there's Alfred Hitchcock, and I said to him, are you going to make another film?

And he said to me, I'm toying with one, he said, and then he leaned closer to me and he said, I said, I'm toying with one now, but I don't know if the audience still wants my fantasy, to which I responded without a doubt. And then I started to write to him, and I spent two amazing lunches with him at Universal, where he sang to me, it won't be a stylish luncheon. I can't afford a munch, and he said, we'll be dining in my dining room in my office in my building at Universal. For you, let

just meet Hitchcock. I'll never forget. Bob Redford was doing quiz show when I got a message to him. The only reason you're with CIA, by the way, is because they can connect you with anyone in the world. Not to get a job, by the way, but to talk to them on the phone. So I wanted to meet Redford and and a car pulls up to my apartment in New York, and a town car takes me out to New Jersey and there in Secoca shooting quiz show.

And I go out there and the woman is there with the headset, gorgeous woman as there's a chair and she goes, it's my chair. I sit down and Bob is directing Rob Morrow or David Paymer to do in the scene at Bob Box. How you doing, I'll be right with you. He directs the scene that they break for lunch to go, goes, We're gonna you're gonna have lunch of Bob's trailer. You can have lunch of Bob's trailer right this way, right this way. It's like Disneyland.

Everyone's very very happy. They're shooting the movie with Bob Redford. So we go. They take me into the trailer and read fast as you're a vegetarian, and I said, back then, I was a strict vegetarian. And he opens up these the woman services from these plastic containers and these tupperware of me eat the thing. And Bob's like, how's this? And I was married to Max's wife. He worked on the Natural with Kim. He said, how's Kim bah blah blah blah blah. Smalltalk. Small talk finally goes, so what

can I do for you? And of course I'm not realizing he thinks I'm there to ask him for money for like a charity. Maybe I looked at Mike, he goes, what can I do for I go, I want you to put me in a movie with you. I want to be in a movie with you. And think he was stunned. That that's why I came all about the New Jersey to ask him. He was like, could was almost mortified, you know what I mean? And I learned that about the business that you don't reach out to them,

You wait for them to reach out to you. Um, We're gonna have time for a couple more, all right ahead, Well, I mean, is there anybody here who doesn't have arthritis? And uh so it would have to be more more than just a labor of love. It would have to be so comfortable. And when ingmar came to visit me in l A, we thought he'd be living there for a while. Uh you know, and he said his agent

he had to listen to his agent, Paul Corner. I said, well, I think of you living in the Pacific Palisades where Henry Miller lived, you know, not to live down here. It's too hot here. And he said, would you consider doing go Off? You're just right for check Off? I said, would you direct me? He said yes. I said, well, I'll have to go away for oh six seven months to learn it, to absorb it, because once you're in rehearsals then it's a business. The clock is going like that.

I'd need to to absorb the text so I could integrate with the people, you know, would I I would want to keep an open mind, but it would have to be so much fun, because then I want to do I wouldn't want to give up a performance. This is what I really love about Al's commitment to theater Piccino. He's really kept it up. I didn't. But he once introduced himself to me at the bar at Downey's, you know, and we've played cards together. He's a much better with

Larry cart player. That's what I hear. We are out of time, and I just want to finish my saying. One thing. Interesting that you reference arthritis. Interesting that your reference. But not all of us are as young as we used to be. Perhaps, But the interesting thing about you, and I mean this from the bottom of my heart. It is everything you are on screen you still are today in every way. You're just as funny and interesting. Everything you have you still have. It's amazing. But's Eric.

Come on? Elliott Gould live at the Turner Classic Movie Film Festival from earlier this year. This is Alec Baldwin and you're listening to Here's the thing.