James Caan: Last of the Tough-Guy Movie Stars

off with that grin and shoa a vive. The streets of Queens are still his spiritual home, but today can lives in Beverly Hills, where he invited me for this conversation. His assistant Mikey is never far away. Come sit with us. By the way, the Cleveland needs a pollock what. There's no denying that con plays a certain type. He was a hard bitten gambler in El Dorado, and another hard bitten gambler in The Gambler. He broke into safes in thief and into houses in flesh and bone. He loved

his macho rolls, but they frustrated him too. I didn't get a fucking script that didn't have twelve people dead by bite twenty I mean for three years and then someone said, oh, wait a minute, you can sing, and Nancy, yeah, well did you know that? Nobody ever asked me. You know, I'd like to do that. So my ambition is not to be a tough guy to you and me when we grew up. You see, you've got a bottle of water. The very top level of that bottle his angle. That's

the first one we draw on where we come from. Right, does that make anything? Yes? And when I when when I did street Her on Broadway back in, people said to me, uh, they said to me, but that must be great to get all that anger out of your system every night. And I said, you know what, I realized about four or five weeks in, I'm not that angry. I said, I would go out on stage some night, said I want to go, Blanche, Why don't you? When I sit down and have a cup of coffee, we

make nice with each other. And you've had a little different career than I have, though not too much. Let's just say that. But maybe the best way to do is to do this you're savvy. You cracked people up. You grow up in New York bub blah blah blah blah. How many brothers and sisters did you have one of each? None of them in the business. Oh no, no, no, you know, my neighborhood was like, I don't know, it wasn't very conducive to the arts. What do they do?

My brother still doesn't know. Right. And your sister she passed away. She's married and had kids, had a family. Yeah, she was the latest. She was like my best friend. I tell you that she's she's the only person in the world that was genuinely afraid of, really afraid of he s he was the best. What did your dad do? A butcher? He was a butcher. Yeah, most of my family were. I mean his side, we're um. He was

from Germany and uh he came over. He was the middle son guy like your dad and had hands like shoe boxes. He came over and he brought the rest of the family. He had two brothers and a sister. He brought them over. But he was he became like a middleman, you know. He got down to the meat market where some of my relatives where my my my godfather was down and had one of them freezers, you know, down in fourteen Street, and and you go and he had like ten fifteen customers, you know, some of the

restaurants you've eaten, and he's sold direct to them. Yeah. Yeah, we drove around and m Yeah. I went to Michigan State when I was sixteen, not because I was smart. I don't even go there. They wanted me out of that school so bad. So I took one summer course and they got rid of me because I became president of the student But I was fourteen years old. But I was big already. I'm three inches shorter than I was then. So I went to Michigan State to play

at me home. Yeah, my mother kept saying, why don't you swim? Can't you swim? I come home taped up to my butt, you know, It's just like and and then I got home sick because my girlfriend and everything was back home, you know. So I transferred the Hopstra and it was that I had that one year. Wait, you know, Howdy Myers was the coach there then, and know where'd she dared coach? I just I didn't know what I wanted. I changed my major every three minutes.

And and then uh, it was an n OLDTC school hopster. So Tuesdays and Thursdays you had to get the uniform on and everything. You know. It was the biggest second lieutenant. And then I think two weeks from graduation, I was on my way to class in my uniform. Everything was spiffy, but I didn't have my name tag on. I had lost it. Whatever is it? So, yes, sir, what was your name to it? I said, you know, you gotta be kidding me right now. One thing that now I'm

gonna fits with. The two of them were on the floor outside the commonans off, going well, it's going well, it's going really well. So that was the end of my RTC career right there. And then I started to go to work with my pop, you know, down the market. He got me a job with my godfather who had

a big freezer. And these trailers used to come in from Texas and my job was lifting these hind quarters of beef awful hook that did not roll, and walking to the back of the sixteen wheeler, putting him on a hook that did roll, and rolling him into the freeze. It was nice getting into the freezer. I swear to God because it was the warmest place in the in the in the joint, you know, it was like right off the river down there, and it was colder than

a well digger's ass. I mean it was. Yeah. And that started about four thirty five in the morning, and I kept thinking, I'm working out for something, but I had not gonna work out for actually anyway, I knew I didn't want to do that for the rest of my life. It just came over me like this is not it. So my dad was a tough German guy, and over something about him was very different, like I don't I can't explain it. He'd come up with things that were really shocked that a butcher is not supposed

to come up with. You know. His best friend was named Johanna Sheeper was a big artist, and you know, it doesn't make sense when I started doing this for a living. My dad was very receptive because he didn't do what he wanted to do with his life. Like my dad went to law school for one year at Syracuse and then he dropped out because my mother's father was paying for it and he had too much pride. He didn't want the father in law to pay for

him to go to finish school. The minute he could get a job teaching down on Long Island, he quit. He didn't go to law school, and he always regretted it. I didn't know it was when I asked, I went to the neighborhood playhouse, right. I didn't know what way to go. I didn't know what to do. So she this neighborhood playhouse. I always enjoyed making people laugh, you know, I mean yeah, I said, how am I gonna tell

my father? I'm going to the I want to go to the neighblood play Now I go to the neighborhood playhouse. It's ten days before school starts, to the neighborhood playhouse. So I go in and I go, uh, I want to go to school here, And they go for next year. No, for this year. I want to go. No. No, you have to have re interviews over the cour city. Yeah, you have to have one in September, one of Reember, one of like a June. Because they don't took thirty guys and thirty girls. So I said, can I say

to something? Mr Pressman's office there for do what you want? So I did, and I went and I said, sure enough, I wasn't. At twenty minutes, somebody was late with somebody would and I walked in and I talked to me much. I thought I was a complete wacko. And he took me right there and there. Now I had the problem of telling my pop. Of course the eight hundred bucks by the way, you know, a lot of money. Yeah. So so now, well I go to work with him. I'm going to work with him, So I'm gonna truck.

I acted all real tough for everything. Oh, he was brutal. And and we were coming up eight the avenue. I think we had stopped at Competios right that, the dance place, you know. So I said, hey, Pop, what do me if ivor pool over here? You're a ballet dancer. Now, yes, wait a minute, I gotta get something for school. What do you what do you mean got go? Do you mean what I mean? It's English? I'm you know, I'm trying to be a way here with him and kill me.

I said, I gotta go here, I gotta get something to school. We'll take a long No, no, I'll just go up and pick it up. I'll be right down. I go upstairs. Sure enough. I have no idea, Dad, spelled leot odds, you know, the whole of the leotards, the top saying the thing and the ballet slippers. Yeah. Yeah. So they handed to me in this plastic in this plastic bag with a button on it. You know, have a little button on a plastic bag. I said, excuse me, what you've got a brown bag? You got a brown

paper bag. No, that's the way they come. I understand that. But yeah, they looked all around it got be a brown paper bag and put it and I jumped in a truck. I said, okay, let's go pop. What's in a bag? Dad? It's something for school. I can just see if I'm going, Jimmy, if you're running numbers right now, you can be honest with me. That that a bag of money. Jimmy, what are you doing? It was worse. I'm again, No, what's the big? I showed him the big?

He never said another word. Alec He sat there and whistled all the way home, just whistled. They just whistled. He went for you know, you were there for how long? Neighborhood playoffs? One year? And what happened? Because the speech teacher asked me to get a late slip once I go, excuse me, what a late slip? I'm paying eight? N't it all? Let's go to the school. And she didn't like my attitude and you left. Now they left, they claiming me I was the only guy that kind of

kind of made that class. What was the first job he got? I got an off roadway show roned author Niecess Laurent, and I did it for about seven eight months a week thirty eight fifty take home, brother, Are you living at home? You got your know? I was living in the taj Ma Hall, of course. I mean I was eighteen and nineteen, and I worked two jobs. I worked at Continental Can Company, and then I worked

at the Rockaway as a rife guard, you know. But then I met this beautiful girl named dj who was the lead dancer on the Mitch Miller show You're Even Too. She lived out in Jersey. So I used to wait get my dad's struck cleaning up the blood in the back. You know, it was a big station where and remembered them green dingle daggles you put all over the car, smelled good pine them all over the cart at a blanket at the back, and I'd go over there and one day, me and a couple of my my Italian brothers.

They took me in the nineteen forty a week with running boards and everything to North Carolina with her and I borrowed ten dollars from my mother. They take me. We drive to North Carolina, Halifax, North Carolina, which is the closest place you go to without needing like a blood test. So I go to Halifax. It's six in the morning when we get there. We drove around looking for justice a piece. Okay, wait a minute, he put

on his boat. What the into the living room, he says, So what kind of a what kind of a ceremony would you? Like? I said, fast, would be good. We got married, my bodies, We got a watermelon. Did you come from a generation that marrying a woman was always the right thing to do before you lived with her? It was it like a value, you know. I just didn't want to ready to have a Yeah, yeah, yeah, don't touch I mean fights like I mean, I was

arranging fan back then. So you go there, and I mean I was totally belonged in a home because if I catch some guy who just the game's over there? What are you doing there? So what are you what are you doing? What do you? Oh? It was terrible. I was terrible, really, but it's my girl, you know. So when we got married, I took her home because nobody knew that was twenty one right. So my dad would lay on the couch like this would a would a wife, beer on, watching wrestling whatever. I come in

and my father never looked up. Well you've been um. We went out where, you know, a few drinks. Would you get married? My right hand to guard with that I heed is laughter like you never heard in your life. For my mother inside cracking up a laughs as she heard, Yes, he parted the knowledge to get married. It's the funniest thing I've ever heard. How do you? How do you think you? Father? I don't know. The guy was weird.

He told me the first thing he told me. I remember this poem he told me when I was twelve. A good friend is hard to find. You always get the other kind. But when you find one staunch and true, make sure you fucked him before he fucked you. That's the first ball. I What I want to say is when you when you did Land and you're doing the play for eight months in New York, did you like the theater. Did you like live theater? When do you see this? I want to get into TV in the movies.

I want to get into that. When do you make the time? The only thing that was on television in New York was the Naked City had just opened, you know that started that was Naked City. Then then uh such kind had Playhouse Third Team, and I did that with Redfoot with obviously Ruby d and Dave was a live three cameras show devon Asian at the time. Yeah, Jones, Scott, that's how you got in the door yet an asient. Somebody repped you. Yeah, and then I got the Route

sixty six came into Philadelphia. I got that. So but the point I think I'm making is that I waited for three or four years before I got our own audition. Now this maybe or maybe not, but it may not be. But I got the first four jobs auditioned for, and I think it's because I waited, you know, like you know acting that you know, or all actors should know, there's so much luck invout and you can't bullshit. You

don't want to tell people the truth. Yeah, I see young people and I'm like, is that you're studying you're at a great program. That's great. But but I don't want to break their heart and say it is a lot of luck, a lot of luck. So I see some people, I mean today, like you know, I teach now. I'm teaching now, which is nice. I like to enjoy it. But you see talented people you can't. You know, You've got to be in the right place at the right time.

What's the first movie you made? Parallan called me and I did a picture called Lady in a Cage, of course, and Olivia to Havelin, who was like a nun I don't know. I mean she was a beautiful, gorgeous, non elegant woman, elegant, unbelievable for people who don't know. She's trapped in the elevator in her house. And you were the I'm playing, which I got nauseous when I showed a perform It was a nauseous Who directed it, Walter Grauman? But you nervous to be making your friend. I was nervous.

He didn't. He didn't. She got me nervous, not because she was a huge star, but she was such a lady and I had to go ya flack and dashing your f and net and you did that? How do you snuck in her face? That was like you talked about character work. I couldn't do it. You know. It was hard. It was really hard. Been there where I played somebody who's tough and who's that? Uh, that's my brother. Yeah,

I placed somebody in a movie. You know, years ago, I do a movie and if I had to be really mean or abusive to somebody that I admired, I do the movie Glenn Gary, Glenn Ross, and I wrote Lemon, And I'm there with Jack Lemon, and I'm thinking, I love this guy and I have to I have to just completely wipe my shoes right on his face and being so mean to him. I hated that the guys were really but but but she was already like a thing, like I remember going to watching her in a movie,

you know, like she was such a lady. Did you move out here then? No? What happened was I did everything that was to do in New York, So I did. It was called black was written by Reginald Rose. This playoffs thirteen or whatever they called it, uh and uh Lamont Johnson directed it. But every Stollards in it. I mean, I mean it was just cons of people in it, you know, Pat Engle and Dish and that Ruby, d

Zzy Davis, Uh Redford and everybody. Yeah. So we did that live and then after that I started getting calls from out here studios. Yeah, I mean you have to come out to do Dr Kildare or whatever the hell it was. So, you know, I go out here and I there's a cow town. What are you driving a half hour for a paper? What are you sending me? I try to get the red eye home, you know, back into the subway, you know, just how to get

back there. And I did that for a while and uh when we got oh, by the way and the end of the marriage story, this can go on? Can we do this for three hours? Maybe have to come back and do parts two? But well, much as we call it, I remember when you used to laugh ship, I'm producing a very serious interview program, very serious about your career, a more seriou smell your career than you are.

But very quickly she didn't want to come out of here. No. No. What happened was, first of all, her parents that were religious Catholics, okay, and I wasn't religious anything. You know, my buddies were Catholic. I went to church, so you know. But they she went home and they wouldn't let me see her, right, they wouldn't let me see her. I was married to her. They should listen. We want you

to get married in the church. I go, I can't do that, I said, because I know I have to sign a paper saying I raised my kids Catholic, and I can't do that. I mean, I don't care, but I had family that died and don some concentration camps just for being a jail so I just can't do that. I'm not a Catholic. Yeah, I'm not a Catholic. I wouldn't mind being a Catholic. It makes no difference to me, but it makes a difference to my family and everybody else. I guess, you know. So no, no, you won't have

to because we know him. We'll meet you in directory and we'll talk and you won't have to sign. Of course, I said, okay, And of course everything I said was true. So I went home and they kept in. Finally, one night she was doing the Miss Miller's show and her girlfriend called, this is so romantic. I just go, do you want your wife? Twenty one years old you want your wife, she's up here in the bronx. She's at

my house. So overtook the meat weg and the buddy wear, just like laughing the thing on, you know, the thing. And she was laying at his four post to bed and but I got man, did work become more important? I came out, you know, I came out. I said, honey, I'm gonna go out, but you know I can't keep flying back, and I'll go out. And I literally got four jobs in five weeks out of here, you know, leads on like the graphic suspension. And then I called for and she came out, and then she did the

Judy Colland show. She wonderful answer, and then and then, uh, yeah, I don't know, man, I just don't know. I was too young, but it was probably too young to be trying to make it happy. And the number really mixed that up. You know, I really never did. My life was my family that comes always. You didn't want the business to become the most important thing in your life because I've seen too much destruction already at a young age.

When did work change? And the next thing, you know, you're above the title and you're the star of the film that really happened quick, you know, Okay? My first one was that then I did right one was with John Wayne and Mitchell. Between those two waves, you know, in what movie Mitchell, who I loved you? You would have went? What was it like with Wayne? How did Wayne treat you? Is it kind to you? This is great Mitchell. He came back two three weeks later, sort

of first week and a half. It's just me and Wayne. It's like what we meet and then we go on this ride and he buys me had stupid gardener? Where do you know there's had called me Mississippi? No mind you you know I have our endless hours talking with Strasburg. And John was a friend of mine, his son we played bold together in the park and this, and so I'm trying to draw in this and so whying to be professional, and and then I listened, Now, look a kid, why did you have to go and do that? This

is the dialogue of the movie. Why did you go and do that? Luke wid you have to go and do that? What do these breaths come from? But I'm looking at him like, you know the reality of it, of whatever bullshit? I just smiled. I just kept smiling. There. You meet these people and you know that has this effect on you. As I left this series I did called Knots Landing that was a very popular show on TV.

My character was killed off the show. They were on on Ava Gardner to play Bill Devane's mother, and I was leaving and I think I was done shooting, and they said, why don't you come back next week? Come on the lot, and you know you still have your pass and everything. Come and meet have a Gardener And she's sitting there in a director's chair smoking a cigarette. She looks like a million bucks. She's older, but she's like and she said, it's so nice to meet you, baby.

She calls you a baby. That was so nice to meet you, baby. What a pleasure. But then when you're on a set and you're shooting and you're making a movie, like the first big movie I did was Hunt for Red October and Sean Connery comes walking on. I'll never forget they did his makeup tests and his camera tests and all the old school in the uniform and the hair, and we're gonna shoot the first day and he walks on and so help me got out with myself. I'm fucked.

I said, no one's ever gonna see me in this movie. They're gonna cut me out of the movie. I said, look at the guy. He looks like ten million dollars stacked up, so he was so perfect looking. And they would say cut and he dabt un to me. I did say, are do you go into the Russia's boy during lunch and I'd say, said the Russia is the dailies of the of the footage And I said no, I wasn't going to go to the rushes and nobody invited me. He said, how do you ever expect to

learn anything if you don't go to the rushes? And he was like, sham to me, and I'll go to the dailies. We watched the dailies and I'll never forget thinking to myself, this guy movie start him as something you can't put your finger on it. He'd sit there, he always knew where the camera was. He'd say the

line and turn into the shot. And I remember men we sailed into history and he turned into the camera and he was remember thinking to myself, I wonder if I could ever learn all the things this guy knows about the camera and how to perform in front of the camera. It was beautiful. That's funny. You know. You bring that up because I remember very clearly when we did all little things together a couple of time, you didn't impress me like that. I mean, that's not impressive

to me one way. I mean, that's me. But I just want to finish the point that there's not a stupid sy Uh watch the mic talking to the mic. Yeah. So now Mitchell comes like a couple of weeks later. I don't mean hybody went and sold the dailies and I had that stupid hat on in order that that and the first thing he said to me, Hey, Jimminy cricket, he called me Jimmy. He's the greatest. Hey, Jiminy what he says? You're doing a lot of smiling and Jimminy cricket he said, I said, what do you want me

to do? You ever hear this guy talked? You know, and Wayne, if you were affected by him, he would never get off, would never get off. You know. He was like a kid man. He just enjoyed it. We come around this corner, the bad guys all the way down the end of his Western street, ding the bar a bad guys. Okay, hawks got the whole street set up, stagecoach and people are walking up and down at night, big set up. Wayne turns to me, says, nah, look

at kids when you say that their line. I want you to turn around and give me that look you give me. Smiling, he says, you know that looked at you give me. He guess he caught me smile a little. Whatever it was, Just turn around and give me that look you give me. We come running around the corner, he says, his eyes. I say my line. God, they gotta wipe the horses down and everything, you know, to sweat. Every takes another if I was set up here, we

get ready. Wayne turns to me. He says, nah, look at it when you say that, Caroline, give me that luck you give me. Okay, duck actual street stow spooming. We come running around the corner, he says, his eyes. I say my line. God, he let me out of it anyway the third time now and I'm steaming. Sonny side is coming out and me so he had the balls to go. Now look at kid again, and I turned around her and I read up and missed him.

Crabbed me from behind and went oh, we usually no, And from that moment on we became the best friend, miss him. I mean, Wayne, Wayne, you stood up for yourself. He groved that. And then they invited me to drink with them. I'm like twenty three, and there went a bottle of scarship for him. And then he would fill my uh dressing rooms with garbage when I wasn't there and he had the guy locked it up, but I'd come and opened my dressing Why is it locks would

come about? You know, you were twelve year old kid. Your hawks direct him or nobody directed him? Yeah? I mean did he stand up to him and tell him what he wanted? He's never got to that. It was never like it was never that. You know, they know Wayne was Wayne. He did what he wanted to do. Yeah, she miss him was the opposite. I met him. Didn't never wanted you to see him working. He was like embarrassed, but he was so good, so good. I guess the

next obvious question, when does Francis call you? How does that called me? Now I knew Francis. He's like a year older than me. Okay, so when he was twenty three, he had written Patton already and he stayed with me. His grandmother lived around the corner from where I lived. You know, Sony said, you know on on Skillman Avenue. I didn't know him and I didn't know her. He also went to Hopster where I I didn't know him me to. I remember him calling me to through the

rain people, which is really kind of interesting. Was the first time any picture, you know, it was done like that with a crew of eighteen. We traveled all across the country. But I think it was like a second picture thing. You know. He wanted me to do Apocalypse. I didn't do it because here the Philippines for eighteen months. That's exactly what he said. But it was match sixteen weeks. Please stop, candimon ship play any part you want, any

American part you want. So I go up to sod Trope and I said, I want to play Colonel Cornerge. He just mowed the beach. It was a great role. He said, Oh, I gave that to Gene Hackman. What what did you ask me to pick any part for? You know, why don't you tell me what part you want me to play? Yeah, I I didn't do it because Sheila Scott's mom was pregnant and I wasn't going down to the Philippines. You know, No, No, you don't understand. You will live in Manila and you've got like eight

servants and every morning will fly to the location. We'll helicopter to the location. I go. Friends, that's like two things I don't like. It was like height and set flies. I don't like it. Okay, yeah, so I I didn't do that with him, but the rain people I did, and I did you know a few of them? And Bobby and who asked you to do the Godfather? Him or someone else calls you. I said, he wanted you to play this part in this movie because there were stories.

I always here were you and Marlin and Duval and al anybody? You had a lot of laughs on this side. You weren't sitting there taking this like there was. There was some super serious at that plays the big bard in a successful movie, in any movie. I believe that is what you can tell when people like one another. I don't care what the genre is, I don't care what the theme is. You can tell when people are enjoying working with each other. And we all did, and

I think it eminates immediately off the screen. Now when he and this is so you don't have to share this. You have to say this, you know what I mean. It's like I mean, I mean, I don't like to talk about acting that much of myself, but like with you, everybody is very Duval is very quiet, and Al is quiet, and Marlin is quiet, and Gazelle is quiet, and your character in terms of the symphonics of it, in terms of the music, you're the real volatile one. You're the

more operatic one. You're the more intemper You're you're the most You're you're the most tough. You're the most physically tough brandons an old man in the film. But the character is and you know, you put you put the lead in the in the in the chamber. Were the first scene we shot was in the Jento Olive Oil Company. Okay, and you'll have to excuse my son. Yeah, no, two great things happened. I didn't know who I was. That was the first day. I'm trying to still figure it out.

And I don't go to all that bullshit every day. You know, you gotta push a button and then the button works. You gotta find a button. That's the hard thing. I just really awkward that I just I don't know. And one interesting thing, this is an a side. I've watched Brando's He's great and and everybody tried to conquer Brando. He just wanted to be talked to. That was the simplest thing. Go ball, you just looked at me. He's

never a problem, never had a problem with Manson. And this came up in that scene where he says, Salons, they've told me you were romantic. Respect. I think as far as I can't say that, you know, he's a dope deal with you know, whatever his reasons, it's not right. I've agreed to meet with you because they told me your alemana will respect you know. So for instance, yeah,

I see what you mean, he says. But the problem more and is I got I use it in another scene that very line in the back of the car with Bobby's in the car with somebody who uses that line, So you gotta say it. So I'm sitting there like a young student to watch you and uh, you know, now most guys will find a place to bury it in the propers Brando goes so great. I said that I must see because to do a serious man respect that one minute he made it so real for himself.

Like he said it, he didn't bury it. It was unbelievable. It was unbelievable. The guy was great, But how deep into the shooting because the sunny character, it's it's on the page because you're banging the woman against the wall at the wedding. No look, but as everything is behavior. No disrespect to any writer ever you say their words, but it's all about behavior. Actor movie star James Kahn. Another brilliant performer associated with the type, albeit a different one,

is Carol Burnett. Through talent and force of will, she overcame everything you'd expect from nineteen sixties TV XCS. And he called me back the next day. He said, Carol, you know it's not for gals. Comedy variety is a man's in. They wanted me to do a sitcom and I said, I don't want to be the same person week after week. I wanted I want to do this. My full interview with Carol Burnett is in our archive

at Here's the Thing dot org. This is Alec Baldwin and you were listening to Here's the Thing when we left. James Cohn. Coppola had given him the role of a lifetime in the Godfather, Sonny Corleone, Brando's murderous oldest son. Con struggled to land the character, but found that after the first day on set, Vicious Sonny would be based on screwball insult comic Don Rickles. I swear to guard out. I was shaving and I was looking at and I don't know why I thought of Rickles. I just thought

of you used to let me laugh. You know. I know Riccles because when I was a young guy, I hung around with all those old comedians. Riccles stuff was like his proudest moment ever because I told him I came in the next day. I could have done Hamlet, I could have done anything as sunny, no matter what, because I had that behavior. What are you gonna do to me? What are you gonna do to me? Make blepa? And I busted everybody's balls from morning till night, and

everybody laughing. Brando couldn't say hello to me without laughing. Francis is gonna win the same fucking suit like for nine months. You're sucking animal, do you hear? You will need a few hours, you know. But the point is they couldn't take it from me. But what I got from what you did is this idea of to me, the sunny character is like, we kill people for a living, We do a lot of add things for a living. We had a lot of blood on our hands. We

do bad things to some people to get money. And what I would get from the Sunny of the movie was I'm gonna have a good time. Yeah, we're going to all these lengths to get this money. You know what I'm I don't know about the rest of you, is I'm I'm a fucking good time. But the drink of a dinner, I'm gonna go bang. This brought out here. I got my safe and and and and that was it, and I and Francis let me go. I mean all that stup being in a better that never was there.

It was all it all came out of. And then weird stuff happened. I remember why I grew up like all my best friend's Italian. So they maybe had two suits, but they had twelve pair of shoes. So I said, hey, to the water, can I have you gave me a parent of kick? Because you know the black and white, it's not in the script, so what No, we don't have the budget. The budget. It was like nothing. One of the Bronx for ten dollars about the black and

white shoes. You remember the black and white shoes, because that was tell me. Then I took a broom handle off, you know the industrial brooms, you remember the big industrial brooms. I showed them back it out of it and put it in my car. What are you putting in your call for? I don't know. It's an attitude of just that. That's what did you guys carry around on the car? How do you know? I know? So so all of

that stuff. And then when I broke the guy's camera, you know, when I'm when I'm coming, when I'm coming, and take I'm taking the license plate out before do not Richard CONTI but but but Clemenza, no, you broke the camera in the in the in the park, I'm going on taking a spin on the guy's thaying. And I walked back not not to be filmed. I mean, so we're supposed to walk in and there's guy took a picture of me, right. I took this, but it was expressed it wasn't whatever relics a real one, and

I smashed it, but I improvised. And then Clement. Yeah. I mean always just let me go. You never stop. And Clementzer grabbed me and grabbed me. You know it just come on sunny and I remember my neighborhood. It was okay, like I broke it. But if anybody did something like that, they're reaching it pop and I put twenty on the floor. But think we think about it again. There there has to be he and this doesn't really

amount to it. But but I was saying what I worship about you in films, what I loved about you in films, was there had to be a guy that that did those things, because Al doesn't do that. Al shoots the guy very reluctantly, and then he should sterling take from all lives, don't we. I mean, you've got to take from your life. I mean, you can't make

that up. But you watch that movie I've seen. But when you watch that movie, the audience, even though violence is out of favor, even though people doing those things is out of favor, you watch that movie realize you've got to have that moment where the guy goes, you touched my sister again? No, this, what was this? I kill you? I remembered it. I didn't think of it. You remember when you were a kid, My dad did that.

My dad. It wasn't ever thought about anything the night before, I just went in, bum, push the button, let's play around and and and you know it was God bless Francis. But uh yeah, I mean it was. It was really you know, Francis never sort of fight either until we shot it. Me and and the stunt man did it. Carlo's double, you know, not him. Okay, be nice, I am nice. You're a good kid. Okay. A brief explanation

is called for. Here. Kahn has a famous fight with Giohnny Russo, the actor who played his brother in law Carlo. In a minute, you'll hear more about their on screen violence. To con it was just embodying his character fully. Russo, on the other hand, even two years ago, was calling Cohn nuts. He says. The on screen fights left him with a chipped elbow and two broken ribs. Now back to the show, So anyway, yeah, France has never saw

anybody fight before. He didn't know how to stage that, right, right. And then the other thing was I come out of a car and Collos loots want and you know, up the street, come in, come, come, come, here or whatever. I said, come in, coup and come out about ninety times. So I reached in and I took out my attitude and Judge didn't plan it, Alec, I swear my mother didn't. Planet. I took out this and was running and I fired

it at him. Francances it's great, great, But Jimmy, you look like you want to You missed him by a mile, showed at him. I hit him, but go ahead. But I hit him in the coconut on the way up the sun double not okay, I would have missed it was stuck the kidding. But but but people want to know. I mean, you are one of the stars of one of the greatest films ever made in history. And when and when you first saw the movie, when you first saw you sit there and go, how this is a

pretty good movie. No, I was mad. I wouldn't go to the show. Why you see, Bobby went nuts Evans. I was staying in my room. I was so piste off because I had an eight page sheet with Bobby and they cut it out. You know what's selfish? I said, what the fuck? You know? They had to come down begged me to come upstairs to the party. But the first time you saw the movie. Whenever, the first time when you saw the movie, what did you think they

shouldn't have cut out that you miserable? Crick? No, no, no, no, no, no, you know you know, I'm gonna tell you something. Francis. It ruined his career because he wanted he wanted what the Allen career. That was his whole thing. He wanted to write and do his own thing. But this monster killed his career. You know, we started doing stuff he didn't want to do. But it's no accident that every department head that he chose became the biggest in their field.

Walter Merch, I mean, Dean, probably, Gordy will it, you just name them, Jack Smith, gonna make up. He had ingenious stuff, like you put a bullet a pace, you can see a bullet go in your face, I mean everything, But it was all Francis. And the number one thing that made that picture successful was the fact that Francis was a Mediterranean Italian. He was not a Brooklyn Italian. Everything was okay for the sake of family. Everything. So when people would ask me, the biggest question asked was

that a real horse's head. Wait a minute, any one. People got killed, but you don't kill about any Was that a real horses? Said? Oh yeah, sure that was a real horses said, I mean it was. Francis was unbelievable.

Francis was unbelievable. And he went to acting school. And now I've started realizing that, you know, I was out of north Ridge and looking at their curriculum and think the guys who were learning to be acted as as freshman directors as freshman, and then part of their things, they take two of their people who were also trying to be and they do scenes with them, and that's like a mid term or what the who? What's the sense they're not working with actors, so how do they know?

So in my mind, it's a requirement if you were a writer, if you were a director or an actor, you must start with one year of acting trying to figure actors think you can direct, so you can direct pull out of them what you need to pull out of them, you know. And that's the big problem with

like a lot of the movies today. I mean, you know, I I used to wake a pot a lot of these guys where I go to the you know, launch or whatever, you know, as it a studio said, I got a great it's a little out of the box. But how about this we do pictures. They got a beginning, a middle, and an end. Is that cool? What am I out of a box? Or what? Now? You always? I mean, in the time we have left, I gotta go pick up my kids. In the time we have left in New York, take them to the park every day.

My I swear to God, I pick them up at five o'clock. The uh. But for a guy that you know, you've been married a few times, you're you know, you like women. Did you ever? And you have to you don't have to answer this question. You have to have the details. But did you ever? Were you ever working with these leading ladies? If you're something like, excuse the ex never go to the bathroom right where you dyed, you where you're dying. Yes, and you wouldn't true, and

you wouldn't do that. Once, when I was very very young, you dated an actress. I didn't dat. I went to you got close with her. I said, would you mind? She said, certainly not. But you made it a habit not to do that. I don't think it became habit. It's just something that I respected. But it's just like what I mean, I'm not fair to the direct I'm not fair to to write it. I'm not fair to anybody.

If God forbid, which usually happens, you have a fight with your girlfriend and you gotta bring in a set and you've gotta make a love scene. Do a love scene. Um, your son? You just changed the subject on me. Yes, when when when Scott gave me a hint? Them? When stop? When Scott made it clear to you that he wanted to be an actor, were you encouraging of him? I'm assuming I never discouraged. You know, he's the best guy.

You never wanted me. He's just a gentleman. He's great, and he never knew what I did until I was eight nine years old. I wouldn't, you know, until the kids on a bus one they said that's your dad, you know, like it was like that, Yeah, why you know, he thought I was a coach. He got it like when he was sixteen. They said they wanted to use him in some films, so I thought it was kind of like throw away, you know some and they should Jimmy what you do? Just want to seeing him? Yeah?

Why not? You know, I never thought the picture would even escape. Then um, he went. I got him into Crossroads because they decided they try to make a normal school out of him, not like an English boys school, because he was like a C student. But he's a great athlete, great athlete. So uh he got in a fight which he into and then they threw him out, and then he went to Devily hiels. I said, you can only go to Beverly Hills Hide if you play

baseball again. So he paid baseball. In the middle of the ear he said, I just signed a contract with Tommy Boy. What who's Tommy Boy? He went on the road with Cyprus Hill House of Pain and he had to little half choose. They called themselves the Lower Level. It was the greatest thing ever. And he went rapping all around the country, aid to the motherfucking ca homeboy, and your Mercedes, who are you kidding? What are you talking to? So? I mean it was great. So he

just and he's unbelievably right. He he's had four plays published with the Alec published. But as far as acting, the material isn't as good my son yours. So if he becomes an actor, Scott, it's never gonna have the opportunity that you and I had worked with the best directors and work with the best screenwriters and the best this and the best at and you know they're not going to have that opportunity. We work with great people

out It was as good as there ever was. James con one of the last of the great old school movie stars. This is Alec Baldwin and you're listening to Here's the thing you have to understand. I do this show and I meet these people, I get choked up and I get choked them