These Are a Few of My Favorite Things, Part 1

from the past several years. But before we get to that, I would like to take a moment to thank Emily Boutine and Adam tie Schultz, my producers for the past several seasons, as well as everyone at w n y C for the opportunity to explore my curiosity with you and speak to some of the greatest artists, musicians, actors, writers, thinkers,

public policymakers, sports figures, you name it. Our roster of guests is really quite something, and I encourage you to visit our archives and download some of our older shows. And of course a special thanks to you the listeners for joining me. This has been the experience of a lifetime, and thank you. They say that casting is everything, and that is no doubt true for an interview show, and we've been quite lucky on Here's the Thing, sitting down

with some rather accomplished guests. My first clip is from my interview with the legendary Barbra Streisand who talks here about how she wanted control of her films in a way that may not have been available to an actress, even one of her stature, so she decided to direct. It was something that happened during the way we were where two scenes were cut out that were intrinsic to the value of the story. And it made me so crazy that they couldn't see that that that propelled me

into it. I couldn't understand it. And it's hard to quarrel with a you know, a hit movie. I don't know if it was a hit at the time. Tell you the truth, it's grown to me say it was. Warren Beatty said to me once, is it. Until you take ultimate responsibility and you're willing to direct the movie,

you're gonna be constantly frustrated. And he said, you must consider that if it was so delicious, And it's like, you know, when you finally have the power to control your work, you you get very humble in a sense, it's like I wanted to give power away to other people as well. You know, I would say to my standing, you run that course with the cameraman, this is the shot, but I want you to be able to tell on

me where to stand. In other words, it's a feeling of such gratitude where you you never have to raise your voice because everybody's finally listening. You don't have to get angry about anything they weren't listening before. Sometimes well, sometimes when I would say things as just an actress, like this is what I'm telling you, this story the way we were it went on deaf ears. You know, they didn't agree with me whatever, But when you see something so clearly, um, that's wrong to me or what

could be right? Or see. I had such a great time directing Yental because I did it in England and in Czechoslovakia. In England they're not afraid of women, powerful women, strong women, because they had a queen. They have a queen and at the time they had the Prime Minister who was Margaret sure So I was shocked at the respect that I had as a first time director. I couldn't believe it. Um and the crew was so kind and just. It was the most wonderful experience, I must say.

And even the Czechoslovakian government was wonderful to me because I needed Jews to be in the synagogue and pray and so for then you know, it was during communist times, and they went to the Jewish community, thank God, and had them come so I didn't have to teach them how to be Jewish, you know, how did some real Jews Jews was an Italian dressed as Jews, like in New York where they have to say, well how do you stand in a synagogue and how do you pray?

And it was it was wonderful. And also well you know when you have extras in Czechoslovakia, then they didn't give them lunch. So the people would come with like bags of their lunch, which broke my heart. So I would, you know, give them our food, which we never had vegetables. We had a cent to London or France or Italy to get vegetables, because you know, their food diet was

like hot chalk. I loved it, of course, bread and butter and hot chocolate in the morning with whipped creamers, and I was on heaven and I wanted to be thinner, but well, and every day I would not every day, but every few days I would bring in pasties, you know, with that delicious dough in the meat inside, and I we'd always have the most delicious teas that I'd bring in those cream like doughnuts shaped like a hot dog from Whimpis and you know, eat this delicious cream with

the doughnuts. Oh my god, it was so good, and they it was very sweet. Because the whole crew wrote a letter that's one of my prized possession, I must say. And they wrote this letter to the newspapers and it said that you know, Ms try said something like Mrs try Sand never raises her voice and has a smile

for us every day. And it's like not the stories we've heard about her, and no newspaper would publish it, but it figures it's like Hillary Clinton, as you said, the upside of that experience where the yentle was working in a culture where the power of women was just accepted.

And I'm crestfall and to say the least about what happened here, not just because this guy won, but I really do think misogyny and well before I did get some sort of Award from Women in film directing yental And a lot of my speech was about women against women, because the reviews of Yentel from women were vicious, you know, in other words, they didn't even talk about this celebration of womanhood, that a woman could not only you know,

make dinner and have babies, but she could have an intellect, she could want to study, be something more do do it? Men do? Just equality, you know. So to read a review that said her she wore a design in the New York Times, she wore a designer yamaka. Now everything, every piece of clothing in that movie was authentic. That same year there was the film directed Buying Mark Bergmann Fanny and Alexander. They wore the same yamica, but nobody

attacked that film. I love detail, so I would, you know, for years, I would do research about Polish Jews, about these Jews, that Jews everything, the Evil Institute in New York um talking to scholars studying Talmud, just to bring that, because I do believe that when you study like that and do the research, you don't have to act that It's like the camera picks up the truth, even just behind your eyes. In the sound of your voice, whatever

it is mine. You know. I had this wonderful shot, I thought, as it cuts from a chicken coop to me sitting behind the bars up separated from the men in the shool. And that shot was attacked by this woman critic, Janet Maslin. Her name was now she could attack my lips incer. That's true. I'm a terrible lip sinker. I can't do it because when I did movies like Funny Girl or Hello Dolly, you know, they record the soundtrack three months before you shoot, and I have to

be in the moment as an actor. I don't know how I'm going to feel when I actually perform it. So that's why when I did the movie Star Is Born, it's all real, it's all um I had. I did not want. I needed to be free, to be in the moment, So we recorded on the spot. What do you call that live? It was all live. And then what I would do is um because I had final

cut on that movie, I could control those things. UM. We would shoot the close ups first, so where the performance really counted, and then I would just choose it right on the spot, okay, I think, And I would do about one to four takes. You know, all these stories about me like I do millions of takes, most of them are false. And so let's say I would take take three, you know, and then move the cameras back to do the wider shot because you didn't have

to see me close, you know, not doing the lip sync. Good. I did a documentary film about can It's ostensibly about Ken and Ryan got thing. We corner him at an hotel. Yeah, I think I saw it. Jimmy Toback and I did this thing called Seduced and Abandoned and we get Gosling at the Beverly Hills Hotel or the bel Air Hotel.

I should say, any long story short is he has this beautiful explication of how agonizing it is to shoot films, and just in that kind of Arthur Murray by numbers way, we have to shoot a match to this and to this. It can't be fresh and it's painful. No, And that's why I love long takes, because I think I'm from the theater and we had to do a whole show, right, So I don't like pieces. I mean, you I the fun of directing to me is designing the shot, the

camera accommodating the actors. So the actors. There's a lot of scenes in Yentle that you can see like this. They're all in one move practically. In other words, we come in through a door and I'm in the foreground, let's say. But he who's following me, the my leader who was Mandy Patinkin at the time, and he still is but um, you know, we see him standing there, and then he comes forward and I sit down. He becomes he's standing up, but the camera never moved, but

you see everything. Then the camera moves as we're together, but it doesn't cut. And then he has you know, when when he leaves me, you see him go out the door. He slams the door and the camera moves in a little bit. As I'm thinking about it, that's the scene. But it's what's fun about that is that we're all on our toes. You can't make a mistake. And most of these shots that I do that there's no coverage. That the greatest on the very little coverage

the actors played the scene in the frame. That's right now now, in the time that you made films, the many years you've made films, the success for acting and not directing, successful as a director and producer and all those things. Were there are people that you wanted to work with, whether people you sat there as a guy, I'd love to make a film with that person because you've been in such a privileged place and I had all these people available to Was there a director that

you dreamed of working with you didn't get to work with? Well, I Mark Bergman is a person that contacted me to do a remake of The Merry Widow and I was so excited, you know, and I came to um Sweden and we embraced and it was this wonderful embrace, you know. I mean he I can't explain what that what that's like. It's was just he sort of understood me, and I understood him without any words. And the first act of that screenplay was fantastic, I mean, very body uh kind

of shocking. I loved it, you know. So then and when I have letters now, I forget things until I have to go into my archives and look at this stuff, letters from him and notes that I wrote back to him talking about this film. What happened the second act? You know, he says we're going to be collaborators, and the second act was not very good. I thought it was like like Jevas Amadeus. I'm sure the first act was extraordinary to me in the movie, and the second

act was I don't know, just somehow repetitious. It It didn't go far enough in the story, you know. And that's the way I felt about this. And all of a sudden it was gone. The collaboration was over. We never made the film, and I couldn't quite believe it. I mean, the fact that I didn't like certain things in the second act did he liked? Well, he never defended it. It was like, you know, I think that's right and so. But I would have loved to work with Berto Lucci and Schris you know what I did.

I realized this now and looking back at my life. I turned down Alice doesn't live here anymore. I turned down a lot of films actually because I was lazy. I'm basically I'm a dichotomy here, a dichotomy lazy and um, I don't know what the word is, restless, restless maybe? Yeah, like wanting to create about you, it would be called the lazy and the restless. Oh no, that's a very good time. Yeah, exactly, exactly I love to take a vacation and do nothing. I like to have no appointments.

And I think that's a condition in my mind of people who have tremendous not so much financial success, but creative success. I mean, there's a famous actress who I won't name you. Wait, you know what? Do you want to take a sip of soup on your Do you want soup to I'll have a soup. I mean we kind of say no. Well, I mean this is a I'm irish. It's bad luck to say no to soup? Is that in Ireland? I just made that up. Oh

just put that over here? Oh see, I just brought this table from the back and we need another table maybe over here because this is me so soup, don't I mean? In other words, people know we eat, right, so if they hear it's okay, good, good, good good, because I always like to eat. Oh really know you know you won't mm hmm. That is delicious, isn't it. That was my interview with Barbara Streisand sometimes the task is to convince some of our iconic guests to sit

down with me. Other times the task is simply to find them. In the case of my next clip. Joe Delessandro proved to be more than a little elusive, but once we got the star of many of Warhol's early films and photography to join us, he was gracious, forthcoming and funny, like when he talked here about his early days as a male model. The criminal guy who's the

modeling agency. How did that play out? Well? He introduces me to this version at once that does these, uh, these photographs, and they said, you know, look, Joe rubbed his oil on you. And it starts out real, you know, really easy. You know, it's nothing, nothing that's too frightening to a person that's you know, being first introduced to it. It's just, you know, take your clothes off and stand over there and nude. Yeah, and for you, did you feel it in that world you want to nose for

people you could trust and not trust. Yeah, So the guy says, oil up and stand over there naked. You knew you were cool? Yeah, nothing, nothing was gonna happen there. Yeah. Did you find it weird? Yeah? I thought it was real weird, But I was gonna get fifty dollars, a whole fifty dollars. That was a lot of money back then. You know, and I thought, wow, fifty dollars was standing, So yeah, Joe making put them up like like you're

making a muscle Joe, you know. And shortly after that, I have a fight with the guy that introduced me to this modeling people because he had this scam that he wanted to do. He wanted to blackmail somebody. You wanted me to do something and I ain't doing that. And also it's a stupid ship, you know. So I got angry and he got he got violent. He was an ex con that was, you know, gonna show his toughness,

not to me. Anyway. He broke a bottle to come at me, and I knocked the bottle out of his hand and went on the ground and broke and uh he uh he did a little dance with him. Yeah. He fell on the glass and got all cut up. You know. Well actually I threw him on the glass and he got all cut up. No, No, he fell on the glass. Yeah, and we hold him down. You were trying to help him. He tried to press charges

against you. Yeah, he tried to do all listen on sense. Anyway, we went to court and they reached my father and say, you know your your son's out here, and oh, you need to send them back, you know, put him on a plane and I'll send you the money. Where'd you live them? And he got to New York. I stayed with him for a week and then went out on my own again. There was the plan when you were back in New York, Well, the modeling thing again? Did

you think this is good money? I never thought about it, about the modeling thing, you know, it wasn't something that I knew anybody. I had a couple of friends in New York that introduced me to other people. And and then one day one of these friends, uh said, Hey, I know this person that's uh making these Campbell soup can you know makes the Cambell soup? And I was thinking we were going to eat some soup, which I

was all for. You're gonna go to the Campbell soup factory? Yeah, whatever, Pennsylvania. I had no idea where it was. You could take a picture of you oiled up, said there's somebody sitting behind a camera reading a newspaper, so I couldn't see who it was or what it was, you know, but they wanted to introduce me that this Campbell soup. Andy Warho guy that I had. You know, I didn't know who Andy Warho was or you know, before I met them. Mine I had married, uh young lady, my first my

first wife. Ah No, I had to be eighteen then. So but it was why did you get married when you're right there? Freedom is a premium for you? Why did you get married? My father was dating her mother, and my father wanted to she got herself pregnant. My father said, you know, you should take we should take this person and he should own up to his responsibility of his kids. Were father. I was also got pregnant with somebody else. My father said, we'll take him to court,

you know. And and I kept telling my father, you shouldn't do that, and you shouldn't push you to do that, because he's gonna come in with a bunch. This is Brooklyn, you know, he can come a bunch of guys saying we all slept with her and nothing's going to ever come from which one of us is the father. Yeah, that's back before DNA and all that other ship. Thank god for yet. Yeah, anyway, so you decided to marry her. I decided to marry her and give the kid my name,

you know, what kind of work did you do? Then? I was a book binder, I went to Actually I was assembly line. I didn't do anything except in the city, yea Manhattan. Who wouldn't know why that job? Because my uncle ran the ran the show was his business. Yeah, well I don't know if it was his business, but he ran the shop. So was there a part of you when you're in Jersey and your book binding and you got a sixteen year old bride has got a kid, and we're not quite sure who in the Brooklyn gang

is really the father? Do you sit there and go I missed standing They're oiled up in a room naked getting the fifty bucks from these guys. I don't know, did you miss that? Yeah? And then you and then you go meet the guy who's behind the newspaper, who makes the soup, who's gonna make you soup for lunch? What happened there? He drops the newspaper. What happens? Obviously he became very fond of you, very quickly. Well, it

wasn't him. It was the guy that was standing to the side of the camera and giving all the instructions to everybody, And that was Paul Marcy. So He's the one that suggested that I'd be in the film because he ow, he was this character that asked everything about your life and I had told him, you know, in junior high had played on the wrestling team. He says, Oh, that's a good idea. We'll have you do that with Undine. You'll you teach him wrestling, so let film that. We'll

film that. What do you described? Morrissey then Marcy real smart, real educated he had. He was a Fordham graduate. He was a social worker before in New York City where he really saw these uh strange people that he had, you know, work with. Uh. So he had plenty of great stories and he shot. Uh these films that was shot. There were silent films I saw. I watched a couple of them. They were pretty good films. Uh you're a movie goer them, you're like, yeah, I was. I loved

the movies. I didn't want to be in them. I just liked watching them. But when you watch the movies at Morrissey and or warhol Man, they weren't like movies you saw in the theater when I yeah, I thought they were a joke. I thought that. Well, when we were shooting this one thing the soup day they were shifting. They asked me to be in the thing, and I shot this most scene and they came over to me after we were done, and uh, they asked me to sign a release. I said, you're not gonna this is

just for fun. Nobody's gonna ever see this. This is it's just I thought, just like a whole movie. I didn't think they were gonna, you know, ever show this anywhere, and thought it was a joke because what was happening there was you know, pretty silly. You know, wasn't you know, anything I ever saw in the theater. It was unfamiliar. Yeah, really, I signed the release thinking it would never be released.

And and then later on they called me and asked if I would them to photograph me for the advertising of this film that they you know, they shot with me first before this movie that was supposed to be a twenty four hour movie that turned into Loves of Undine. They cut it into a smoom. That was your first movie, and that was my first movie with him. But before that was ever released, they had called me up and he did to ask me to be in another movie.

And then he put Paul on the phone who told me, Yeah, Joe, we're going out to Arizona to shoot a Western. Would you like to be in the West end? I said, sure, that'd be great, but you gotta pay me what I would I make at the book binding place, as I can't take off. I'm married now, I gotta take care of my all his bullshit, Yeah about what I was making. They paid you exactly what you made. The probably they

were cheap. They were always cheap. They didn't want to pay somebody too much, and then somebody else asked for the same thing. You know, is it amazing you sit in a room back in nineteen sixty seven with a bunch of people who later on the soup can guy would sell his paintings for tens of millions of dollars. Yeah, he becomes one of the richest artists in history. Did you have an artistic sensibility but you thought that these guys were or you? Just as you said, it was

just unfamiliar and silly. Well in the beginning, and you know it all, it wasn't for me and and Andy's art. You know, we all participated in making the Andy art. They had said, you know, after we had shot the Cowboy movie and we came back. I thought that was it.

Go back to book binding. And you know, I called Paul ask him about the Western and he had told me that he had a job for me at the factory and I said, okay, you know, and he happy to give up what I was doing, you know, doing something there, and I went down to the factory and that was the day. Then Andy was shot when I showed up to the factory to work there. Sometimes at the onset, I wonder where the conversation might go, and by the end I realized I could have talked with

my guest for hours. Such is the case with Joe Delessandro. Thank you, Joe. My next clip is from my interview with Elaine Stretch. Elaine had quite a career. Towards the end of it, she played my mother, Colleen Donaghye, on the television series thirty Rock. When the show was over, Elaine announced she was leaving New York and we were lucky enough to catch up with her before she relocated home to Michigan. And if you know Elaine, it comes as no surprise that the interview could just stop at

any given moment. Where is my black bag? Alec Hunter? I need. I need orange juice. Hunter, come in plays? Can we send Hunter in here? Plays with the provisions? Hunter. Ryan Herdlika, who accompanied Elaine to the studio, came through the door juice in hand. I need some orange juice. Beanies is kicking up, Hunter, my good man, hunters right with the world. Okay, we'll how about a glass. Yes, that's a clean water. We'll get him a clean we'll go, we'll go get her clean. All right, it's all right

if you just empty that glass, it's heaven. I need some orange juice. You know that I'm diabetic, Yes, of course, I mean the world knows by now, the world. It's okay. You know what I quoted the other day, the line of my father's that really is so naughty and just so much fun. Here's looking up your old address. Isn't that a great line? And he said it with no he used that was it. That's right? All right, I'm gonna drink this and bring the orangese now so we

don't have some event here. That's cool. Alright. So now that you've had your orange juice and your brain freezes over, Kirk Douglas, what was the show? Do you remember now? Woman? Bites dog. That orange juice. It's a miracle. Elcksir. I want to be a case of that orange juice dog, woman bites dog. What do you play in that? If you girlfriend? He lived with I didn't even know what that phrase meant. You were a floozy? Well no, I wasn't. I just but I lived with him and I wasn't

married to him. I didn't know what that meant. What do you remember about Kirk Douglas. Oh my god, I loved him. Oh god, I loved him. And what an actor he was. And he's one of the few men who was as great an actor as he was a star. He was a great actor. He was a great actor. He was a great actor. I loved him, and he loved me. He flipped over me. I've known him for years, and he took me halfway away for the weekend, and

then I discovered that I shouldn't go. He took you half way away to Palm Springs, and then I said I shouldn't be going. So what did do you hit? Like? What helds? I do know? We were halfway to Palm Beach, Palm Springs things. So you're driving east. We were driving for the weekend and you decided you didn't want to. Well, I said, I'm getting nervous, because what do you want me to do when we get up here? Oh, Elaine, you knew I was a virgin, so he was dealing

with that. So what was the first leading role you had on Broadway? Big roll? Take more horors, you see you can remember of the big part, big big part I had was Angel and the Wings, which was a review, hardest thing in the world to do a review, and the kind of review like New Faces, was like Leonard Sulman's sketches. And I was the big busted you know, girl in the in the bedroom. I was the I was the piece on the side. Yeah, where are you?

Isn't amazing? You were this virginal You went to suck or cur and you went to finishing school and I played as soon as you're out, God is just tempting you. He's taking Marlon Brando on one side of you, and Kirk Douglas has reving up the convertible to take you to Palm Springs, and you're the fluzi here and you're the piece on the side, the bust defend fatalel But what I was really doing is learning my lines to the play or to the television or to the I

was really loving acting. I loved it. I loved pretending. I just loved it. Was being somebody other than I was was my idea of a good time? Was part of that process for you? Learning from people you work with, it you admire. Did you look at other people and say, because I've had that. I mean, I'm not going to say I had it well like Merman? When you worked with Merman? Did you learn from Merman? Did you did you know you didn't? I did her part right. I

did her There's no question, so she would not. Some loved her, everybody loved everybody. But I know how to do that. And I was so frightened and so terrified, and I was so good in it. Did you feel that she was of that type where just Mermin as Mermaid, she goes out into study. She made, you know, so long. She'd say goodbye to me from the wings on my opening night and then go sit in the first row. She scared me to death when I got to the end of call Me Madam, it was mine? You felt

that way? When do you think you became you? The moment I started to rehearse Mermaid's part. I was doing the New Mermaid, the New Everything. That's when you became you. Yeah, So doing the piece doing call Me Madam is when you felt things changed for you. You felt you were were not necessarily now everything I did, everything I did was you know. But when you do a show Elaine Stretch at Liberty, when you do a show that is a memoir of your career, oh yeah, and it is

enormously successful, when did you think in your life? When did you reach a point in your life that you felt you were someone who could write a memoir about your life, that you thought it was interesting enough. When did you cross the line and say, yeah, I was convinced by this producer who said, who saw me perform at a Judy Garland special at Carnegie Hall? And what I did was tells Judy Garland stories And I told

her it was a tribute to Judy. She's gone by this, yeah, and oh boy, I really did know her very well. From where did your first meet her? Party? At a party someplace I don't know. And I loved her. So when I tried out one of my stories on Judy Garland, I mean she tried out one of hers. I said, Judy, I've got an idea, and I sincerely did. I said, I've got a great idea. Why don't we tour Maime? I said to Judy Garan And she says divine. She

said that sounds great. I said, but here's the good idea, Judy. When I do Mame, I go to bed early, and when you do me, you go to bed early. And then the other one does vera she want a switch on and off. Yeah, she bought you. She's listening now and she's saying okay, okay, okay, and she's counting up the songs. What songs she has? What? And after this long pause, she looks at me and says, what about Matene's?

And I thought it was one of the funniest things I've ever heard in my whole life, that Judy Garland wanted to know what about Mattenees. That's how she carefully. She wanted her her career planned so she could be able to get loaded when she wanted to. And you know, it was her way of treating a very serious discussion. So you did a tribute thing where you told stories about her, and that's when someone pitched the idea to you of doing a memoir of your career. That's right.

What vaguely and said, you tell a story to an audience the like of which I have never heard. That's true. I was that the opening night at the Public, when that Liberty opened at the Public, and everyone who was had a pulse in New York. Everyone who was alive that night came to that opening at the Public. Everybody in the theater came. They went crazy, They went crazy. It's lovely, God, it's lovely. Success is lovely. It's so hard, and it's such hard work, but it's so gratifying. What's

the hardest thing about it for you? What's been the hardest thing? Do you find it hard? To have? The fear of what that you won't be able to perform, the fear that I'm just going to forget, and I'm going to not not so much forget, but it's the fear. It's the fear. And that was when I was not drinking at all, and I didn't drink anything to get my talent on, but all my life I had. Have you ever done a show? I'm sure you've done countless shows.

You ever done a show where you're sitting backstage thinking what am I doing here? How did I get myself into this? Or? Were you always engaged by what you were doing? I was always engaged with always. You never took I was leading up to it or coming down, you know, I I was trying to get it behind. You never regretted doing anything? Never? No, that's incredible. No, I never never regretted doing anything on the stage. Never. How was that possible because I just one every time

I walked out there. You know that old expression about I own the stage. That was from my interview with the incomparable Elaine Stretch. Some of the musicians I've interviewed have had tough lives, during which they created some of the greatest music the world has ever heard. The next clip is from my interview with David Crosby, the self described mischievous kid who started singing folk songs at age six on his way to his remarkable career. And you

go to boarding school? I did, Yeah, Kate? What was that block? What were you like? Were you always mischievous? And it get load of trouble Why I don't know, but it's definitely true. I got thrown out of almost every school I was ever in, including Kate, What was music in your life? Then? Music came early, and well, uh, my mom sang in choirs. My dad liked music. He

could play a mantle in. My brother played guitar. We used to Here's an interesting thing when when we were growing up in the fifties, when TV started to really happen, we didn't have a TV, so we sang folk songs out of the fireside Book of Folks Songs, and that was where it started. Did anybody tell you then you could sing that? They say you're a good singer. They did notice that I was singing harmony when I was six,

And huh, what's the first instrument you played? Guitar? My brother turned me onto guitar when you were how old? I guess maybe can what's the best time you think that. My son is two and a half years, so it's gonna be three in June. He's obsessed with simulating playing the guitar. He actually has a band with my wife. He calls her Trista, and he's Mr Pants. Mr Pants. He'll turn to my wife a little I've got it on video. He'll turn to my wife and Trista, what

are we gonna play now? He's two and a half. Don't let him be a musician. We wanted to. It's terrible idea. He'll never have a job. Actually let him. Do you think that if you didn't? But when you say that, do you think if you hadn't made it as big as you made it, you wouldn't have stuck with it, or you would have stayed with it because you loved it. I would because I love it. I love it so much, like I can't tell you I love seeing it. I'm good at it. But that's not

really it. It's there's a joy to singing in and of itself, and it's it's an elevating thing. It's totally freaking wonderful. It's very tough for me now, man, because I'm really old and getting on the road exhausting. Yeah, well it beats the crap out of me. Yeah, because you'll never get more than four hours sleep in a row. And then in the middle of that, you had an expansion joint and playing. You're away again and you know, and you're eating terrible food and restaurants. When when did

you when you left home, you didn't go to college. No, I went one year and you went to uh City College in Santa Barbara, which is now, oddly enough, the highest rated city college in the country. It was interesting and good, and I had one really good teacher hooked me up about some really interesting things about semantics and the language. And no, you weren't sending music then, then, no,

not yet. I was. I was bussing tables at the local coffeehouse because as a bus boy they would let me sing harmony with the guy who was being paid to sing. And what was the first band you were in? Less Baxter's Balladeers. Let's Baxter, you know, a band leader guy. He had seen the Christie Mittrels, which that guy who sparks were he was he had I think he had three of them out their bands like that in your old name the same you know. It just it was

a commercial operation and was really lame. But we was put food on the table. My brother and I were in that. And then I ran into Roger mcgwinn and Gean Clark and where a tributor bar it's a tributary and they were singing and it was good and these songs were you know, James pretty good writer. And so when those two haven't they had an act called they have an act, we're just playing. They were just in

the bar. You know, Roger has been a musician for a while and successful and played with other bands, Lime Letters, Chad Mitchell Three, a bunch of different people, so he knew what he was doing when he knew that Jean was talented and that this stuff had value because it sounded a lot like Beatles songs, and uh, so I started singing harmony to them. They said, what's your name? And uh that worked out really well. It was a good band, simple good. Roger's extremely Good had taken Bob

Dylan so and turning them into pop records. And you covered Tambourine Man. Yeah, that was our first hit. Well, what did you learn about bands in your first band? What that experienced like? I learned that that I had a lot to learn. I was just a young punk and I really had no idea how to actually work with the people and accomplished the aim that I wanted to. I had an experience early on when I was young.

My mom took me to see a symphony orchestra in a park free show there in that way, and they tuned up and they got ready, and then he started the piece and it was this huge, beautiful wave that hit me. I didn't know anything was like that. You know, symphony orchestra a hugely powerful thing. And it freaked me out. And the thing I've realized even as a kid, the power came from they were alding me together. I can't believe you just said that. It's the truth, and it

really and it penetrated. So I've always wanted to be in a band always. I love cooperative effort. Competitive effort winds up at war, cooperative effort winds up. I'm I'm watching Tom Petty's band playing a benefit, and Offend was with me. I turned him and I said, do you see what I'm seeing? Reference said what? And I said, they're all doing the same thing at the same time.

I said, they're all in service to and feeding. You know, in my business, not everybody's doing the same thing that they're kind of doing their own thing, kind of jerking off in the corner there, you know, Patty's band was doing the same thing. Yeah, it was really really, very very cool. Do you find in a band does somebody always need to be in charge? Does somebody need to be the boss? It can go both ways, and the birds Roger was definitely the leader of the band, and

that worked well. Yeah, he knew a lot more than we did. And he's also an extremely talented guy and a good singer. And uh so it wouldn't you know, I challenged it at every turn, but he was the leader of the band, uh c s And why none of us was willing to admit anybody else was the leader. Where it was and probably still is one of the most competitive situations in the history. Uh And he goes really just that simple, And in spite of all the

incredible success you've had. I mean, who's when you think of people, when you think of men harmonizing in a group, the first people that come to mind of the three of you, why do you think that that didn't bring them any comforts? I don't think that's what they went in for. And I don't think they realized exactly how good it was. We did really like each other when we started, and we were thrilled, you know, by each

other's songs. So you leave the birds and and and and Stills leaves Buffalo Springfield and they bring you with them Springfield Sorrow fell Apart Left, which is kind of his m O. Uh Stephen was very appealing guitar player and singer. I mean, it's really good. Remember how well he played acoustic guitar back down beautiful, pretty stunning, And so I started hanging out with him, and then Cass

introduced mut the Ground. But when Nash leaves the Hollies, the Hollies are doing very well, aren't they very successful? Why does he leave? The Hollies told him you did. I went to work, I went to London. I told me she quit? And how did you do that? We dil you quit? Why? Because he could join us? He was at a very crux point with the Hollies. They wanted to do an album of Dylan covers. Now there are bands that should do Dylan covers and there are

bands that should not do Dylon covers. That was one of the bands that should not do Dealing covers. And they were ignoring his songs. He had already written a Lady at the Island and they didn't get it, beautiful song. He had already been right between the eyes. They didn't get it. He he was already outgrowing them. So I walked in and I said, hm, hmm, this is pretty ordinary. And I was funnier than they were, and I knew more than they did, and I did it on purpose,

and they'll probably never forgive me. But it made a great sound. We the three of us, when we heard each other saying it was it was spectacular. But bands get together and you're in love with each other and so wonderful and exciting, and then it devolves and forty years later it's turned on a small machine and play your heads and you don't even like each other. You don't write the same bus, you do not hang out,

and you are competing with the other guys. So it's easier to do the touring and get on stage and get that on and get that of what than it is to be. You don't go into a studio anymore because that's more intimate that died quicker. Yeah, the money is so good on the road in a band like that, you know that you you won't stay there. It means big crowds, big places, big deal you can get. Yeah, but it got to pomer is no fun? Is it about when it starts to crack, when it starts to shift?

Is it because of songwriting? No one's getting that too. Wants to see my songs. I want my songs on that album. Who's the decider? Did you guys acquiesced to producers? No? Uh, we always produced our records and uh and are we had what we call the reality rule. You come into the room, you know, just us, nobody else and seeing each other song and they either liked it didn't and uh, if they liked it, you know, then we start figuring out how to sing it. And these are hugely talented guys. Man,

they came with a lot of stuff. So before it was the four of you, the three of you was basically pretty good. Yeah, it was okay, you know. Uh. Neil's nickname is sometimes it's CSN sometimes why you know, uh, and when it would be C. S and Y, it was a lot bigger that You've got to know that that's the reason to see us and has always Neil's decision, because if there's twenty thousand people in the stadium, Neil

put ten of them there. That's the truth. And so he's he's the one that's that's said, that's it's done. He doesn't want to do that anymore. And I don't think he needs to to see us someone. I don't think you'll ever see it again. When you say he's sometimes and he comes and goes. Is that his nature in all things? He just has to tough time committing to anything. No, he's on his own path and he

does not relinquish that ever, under any circumstances. And uh, he does not want to be dependent on anybody else and probably doesn't want to explain the money. I don't know. I've never asked him, but I know he I think you know I had to come to this decision. It's a very hard decision, man, This is a very hard time for us. I don't know if you know this,

but streaming pretty much destroyed our earning power. It took half, at least half of our earning power away from us because they folks, they don't pay us for records anymore. And that's really sad. Uh, they got that deal passes and they it's sort of this if you worked your job and they paid you a nickel for every two weeks.

It's the proportion is drastically tiny. So with Neil gone and cs N still earning but really frozen in place and really unpleasant I mean incidents that I will not tell you about, but violently bad, carefully chosen more my thanks again to David Crosby. We presented several of our shows live, and one of my favorites was with director William Freakin. Thank you very much, good evening, recorded at the Turner Classic Movie Film Festival. Freakin is one of

the most entertaining storytellers I've ever sat down with. Here he is following a screening of The French Connection. We then sent it to Jane Fonda, who sent us all the same telegram that said, why would I want to be in a piece of capitalist rip off bullshit like this? Now I've seen her since and she doesn't remember having sent that, but I haven't. That was her response, that I don't know how she really felt, but that was her response. He was honest. Yeah. Meanwhile, Ellen Burston was

hockeing me all the time. I had seen the Last Picture Show, but I didn't know Ellen Burston from Claris Leachman. I didn't know which was which. But Ellen said to me, do you believe in destiny? Has anyone ever asked you that before? Uh? No, Well, she was the only one who ever asked me that. And I said, well, I guess I believe, And she said, I'm destined to play this part. I said, look, with the studio wants Jane Fonda and Bancroft or Audrey Hepburn. This was all going on.

She said, I don't care. I'm destined to play this part. And it came about that she was the last person standing, and so we cast her against the wishes of the studio. They did not They wanted a big star for that um. Then we cast Stacy Keach to play Father Carris. He was a great is a great actor. He was the go to Eugene O'Neill actor on Broadway. And what happened. I went to New York and maybe it was that no,

but no, we cast her. I went to New York and I saw the opening night of a play call that Championship Season, and it was written by a man named Jason Miller. Never heard of him. Uh. I thought the play was great. It was it really reeked of lapsed Catholicism. It was a play about a group of high school guys who won a championship under their coach, but cheated to win and they were suffering this guilt

and the stage was just filled with Catholic guild. I felt. So, I I said to my casting director, who was this guy that wrote this. I'd love to talk to him, just to talk to him. It turned out that he had studied for the Priesthood three years at Catholic University in Georgetown. He came up to meet me in in I was staying at the Sherry Netherlands Hotel and I had the flu and I had a lot of pills. He thought I was a pill freak, and uh, I thought he was a drunk. And he didn't know what

the hell he was doing up there. And I asked him a lot of questions about studying for the Priesthood and stuff, and it was a horrible meeting. And I went back to Los Angeles and about two weeks later, as we're starting to prepare the picture, he called me at Warner Brothers and he said, hey, you know that that book you were telling me about that You're going to film that Exorcist? He said, I said yeah. He said, I am that guy. He said, I am that character.

I said, well, you're not Stacy Keach is that he's going to play the part. He said, I'm telling you, man, I am this guy. And he said, have you ever done anything like a screen test? And I said no, I've never shot a screen test. And what's the point. I told you, we've cast this. He had never made a film, never been in a movie, only play a

very small acting roles in a road road companies. He was delivering milk in Flushing, New York when he wrote Championship Season, and so he said, you gotta test me. You have to give me a screen test. I said, why, what a waste of time? He said, Man, I'm telling you so. I had great respect for him as a writer. I said, you want to shoot a screen test? Okay, you come out here on your own. You get out here.

It was like, let's say it was a Tuesday. I said him, get out here by Thursday, and I'll shoot a screen test with you, and i'll take it out of the camera and give it to you so you can show it to your kids. And uh, he said, oh, I can't get out there Thursday. I said, what do you mean. He said, I don't fly. He said, I'll take the train. I'll be out there in a week,

all right. So I set up an empty stage with a great cinematographer named Bill Freaker, and I had cast Burston and I said, look, we're gonna do a test to this guy, and let's do the scene where you first meet him in a little park in Georgetown and you tell him that you think your daughter is possessed. And she said, what, why are we doing this? You've got a great actor. I said, I don't know why

we're doing this. And I swear to God, I didn't We shoot the test, no sets, just Bill Freaker lighting in an empty studio, and they did that scene one take. And then I had Ellen Uh interview Jason with the camera over her shoulder on him, where she just asked him questions about his life, who he was, what his background was, his family, everything, And then I shot a very tight close up of him saying the Mass, but not saying it the way you used to hear it.

Maybe you still do in church where the priest just rattles that off, you know, the name of the Fathers a little book. I said, I would say the words of the Mass as though you really mean them, and well, you mean every word, and and say it, Uh with as much conviction as you can, and take your time, and I shot that in the close up, and we did that and I wasn't sure about anything, but Burston came over to me and said, you're not going to hire this guy, are you? And I said, well why not?

She said he can't act. He said he's not an actor, he can't act. And she said, when I tell father there caress this story about my daughter, I have to break down and collapse in his arms, and I need a big strong man to do that. It happened that she had was going with a big strong man at that time who was an actor that she wanted me to consider. But uh, she said, this guy is about five six. I said, you're probably right. And the next morning I saw the dailies and the camera just loved

this guy. The camera just loved him. He looked great, he was real. And I went to Warner Brothers and I said, we're gonna pay off Stacy Keach and hire this guy. And they said, you're out of your mind. What is wrong with you? You're crazy, but you're possessed, Yes, something like that. I didn't want to do it, the writer didn't want to do it. Uh, nobody wanted to do it. But I said, this is what we're gonna do, and that's what we did. And he was brilliant, incredible.

You said that, Nichols said, no twelve year old could carry that film. How did you solve that problem? You yourself with Linda Blair. H Nichols was wrong because he had not met Linda Blair. We we had cat We had auditioned several thousand girls. They were put on tape from all across the country by casting directors, and I must have looked at five hundred of them myself, just a minute or two and then out, and it appeared that there was nobody who could play this part who

was twelve years old. And I had reached a point where I felt like that we couldn't make the picture. You could not find a twelve year old girl who a would understand all this stuff or be not be scarred by it, maybe for the rest of her life. And I didn't see that possibility in any of the audition tapes. We started to look at sixteen year olds who looked younger, and fifteen year olds, and one day my assistant in New York said, there's a woman out

here who has brought her daughter. Her name is Eleanor Blair, and she doesn't have an appointment. Would you see her? And I said, okay, why not? Because we were striking out all over the place. In came this little girl with her mother. She was twelve, and I knew immediately that she was the girl instantly she sat down. She had never acted. She had done those things that you see like in the New York Daily News, in these newspapers with girls model coats and little dresses or shoes

or something. She had done that, but no acting. So she sat down with her mother and I am she was a straight A student in Westport, Connecticut, and she was had one blue ribbons showing horses at Madison Square Garden. But had never acted. But I said to her, Linda, do you know anything about this story? Do you know anything about the the Exorcist story? And she said, oh yes, I read the book as she did. She said yes, and I looked at her mother. Mother nodded, and I said,

what what is it about? And she said, well, it's about a little girl who gets possessed by a devil and she does a whole bunch of bad things. I said, well, like what and she said, well, she hits her mother across the face, and she pushes a man out of her bedroom window, and she masturbates with a crucifix. And I said, uh. I looked at her. Mother was smiling and I said, you know what that means. She said what I said to to to masturbate? And she said

it was like jerking off, isn't it? And I said yes. Mother was still smiling, and I said to her, have you ever done that? Have you ever done what you just said? She said, sure, haven't you? And so I hired her. My thanks again to William Friedkin. I think you can understand why that's one of my favorite shows. Tune in next time for part two of my farewell compilation show. Again, my thanks to Barbara Streisan, Joe Delessandro, Elaine Stretch, David Crosby and William Friedkin join us next time.

Thank you,