Gilbert Gottfried's Amazing Colossal Podcast - 143. Dick Guttman

Episode Date: February 20, 2017

Renowned Hollywood publicist Dick Guttman talks to Gilbert and Frank about his 60+ years as a Hollywood "flack," promoting the careers of stars like Warren Beatty, Tony Curtis, Kirk Douglas, Paul Newman and Elizabeth Taylor (among hundreds of others). Also, Dick praises Gene Hackman, pranks James Mason, parties with Marlon Brando and pens a joke for Uncle Miltie. PLUS: "The Sweet Smell of Success"! Harpo speaks! Laurence Olivier hams it up! Cary Grant shares the spotlight! And the greatest year in movie history! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Tennessee sounds perfect. Hi, I'm Gilbert Gottfried, and this is Gilbert Gottfried's Amazing Colossal Podcast. I'm here with my co-host, Frank Santopadre, and we're once again recording at Nutmeg with our engineer, Frank Furtarosa. Our guest this week is a legendary Hollywood press agent who broke into the business at the tender age of 19 and within two years found himself working alongside luminaries like Gary Cooper, Maurice Chevalier, Audrey Hepburn, and Billy Wilder. In his six-decade career, he worked with, befriended, and influenced the careers of well over 500 performers, including Paul Newman, Barbara Streisand, Gene Hackman, James Mason, Maximilian Schell, Elizabeth Taylor, Peter Ustinov, Clint Eastwood, both Kirk and Michael Douglas, and Cary Grant. He is also credited with inventing the Oscar screener, bringing well-deserved attention to films like Annie Hall and The Conversation. In addition, he's worked on publicity campaigns for dozens of historic movies, including Bonnie

and Clyde, Spartacus, American Graffiti, The French Connection, The China Syndrome, Shampoo, The In-Laws, Heaven Can Wait, Brazil, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, and The Artist. He's also a produced screenwriter of the films Back Door to Hell, A Touch of Scandal, and Passionflower, writing for actors such as Jack Nicholson, Richard Harris, James Earl Jones, and Christopher Plummer. His terrific new memoir is called Starflacker, Inside the Golden Age of Hollywood. Please welcome to the show an eyewitness to showbiz greatest era and a man who once shared a limo with Warren Beatty and Georgie Jussel. Dick Gutman. Oh, thank you so much.

You saved the best for last. My wife and I were just talking about that ride in Vegas, and it was astonishing. George Jussel was a philosopher. And Warren, you know, at the height of his, the kind of esteem that he enjoyed all of his career, just sat there and absorbed. It was quite amazing. Was it back in the 70s? Yeah.

It must have been early 70s. Early 70s. Because I was still at Rogers and Cohen. And we were flying a whole bunch of celebrities up for a Milton Berle opening. Okay. Well, that brings us to the question I ask every one of my guests who has dealt with Milton Berle. Uh-oh. Yeah, it's true.

What? It's true what you're about to ask. You went right for it. So you've actually seen it? Well, you couldn't go into his dressing room after the show without it because he would always wear... No, I'm not kidding.

He would always wear a robe, but the robe was always open, and it was a painful fact of life. Amazing. There's a good Burl story in the book too, Dick, the story about him being on the plane, and they're flying around to burn off fuel. And he got up and did two hours of material. But he couldn't remember in the material. So what happened was the New York News for the Sunday News wanted to do a double truck. That's two pages next to each other. Story byline by Milton about – he entertained them for about four hours.

Oh, I love that. And so we sat down in his dress at his office at William Morris. And he was always famous for that he kept files of other people's jokes and everything. He did. There were these defiling cabinets. And I think his guy's name was – I forget. Hal Collins, I think. And it was one of his writers.

So we sit down and I'm going to do the byline for him. So we're going through it and he's telling me the different stories. And I said, well, there was something that annoyed you. You just didn't do four hours. He said, oh, there's this kid kept running up and down the aisles and he was stepping on all my punchlines. and down the aisles and he was stepping on all my punchlines. And I said – and you said to him, I said, kid, sit down. I said, no, you said something that was really funny. He says, what?

I said, you said, kid, go outside and play. And he said, what? I said, you said, kid, go outside and play. He says, we were 30,000 feet over Bayou, New Jersey. He would have been killed. I said, but that's a funny line. And no. So we go through and we finally winded up after about two hours. And I said, you know, I still don't have a really solid punchline that's different than what you have in your act.

And he says, well, come up with something. And he says, what was that thing? Hal, what was that thing I said to that kid who was running up and down the house? He says, Miltie, you said kid. Why don't you go outside and play? He says, yeah, let's go with that. I love it. Rejected it from you, but fine the second time.

Well, that's okay. That's okay. You know what? I join a glorious group of people who Milton Berle stole a joke from. Of course. Now, we have something in common in that we were both asked to be guest programmers on Turner Classic Movies. Yeah. Great honor.

Yeah, and so much fun. And I remember I was on and I picked four movies, the original of Mice and Men with Janie and Burgess Meredith. Right, right, right. And Freaks and Burt Lancaster and The Swimmer. Oh, yeah, The Swimmer. And Gene Hackman and The Conversation. Now, you know Gene Hackman. And he played an important part in the success of the conversation. Yeah. Well, Gene played an important part in my success because when I left Rogers & Cowan without bringing anybody with me, I didn't think it was appropriate for me to take somebody else's clients.

And Warren Beatty called and he says, I want you to handle Gene. He just had done French Connection. They didn't really know what they had actually. And it was sort of famous that Gene was the number seven guy. Ahead of him was Jackie Gleason. Oh, yeah, all the people they wanted for French Connection. They couldn't get somebody. Frank Sinatra they wanted.

I think so. Yeah, I think it was. But he was – Gene was so brilliant in that. So many films. I know that you like Night Moves. We were talking about it before we turned the mics on. I mean everybody knows the French Connection and everybody knows the poseidon adventure and those kind of things but but night moves and all night long and gilbert you like i've never sang from my father yeah and uh so many

great i mean smaller films like like prime cut you know that he's great in eureka i mean uh so so much great scarecrow the list goes on and on i. I mean, it's just such an impressive body of work. He did Conversation and Scarecrow back to back. Yeah, amazing. And what's interesting is that when you think about your career, being a publicity guy with old Hollywood and all these great stars, publicity guy with old Hollywood and all these great stars. The first thing you think about is Burt Lancaster and Tony Curtis and Sweet Smell of Success.

Oh, yeah, Sidney, Sidney Falco. Exactly. Sidney Falco cast a curse on press agents. What is it now? It's 60 years? No, it's close to it. And the terrible irony is that I was handling Tony, and I did that campaign. It's a hell of a movie, by the way.

It's a great movie, but everybody thinks that's what press agents are. But you said you never met a Sidney Falco in all your years in the business. I never met one. Yeah. No. I mean, I met guys who were conniving, but let's face it. Sidney Falco would jeopardize people's lives in order to get a break. And all drama is an overstatement.

But this really cast a curse on us. What has this boy got that Susie likes? Integrity. Acute, like indigestion. What does this mean, integrity? A pocket full of firecrackers. Waiting for a match. You know, it's a new wrinkle.

To tell you the truth, I never thought I'd make a killing on some guy's integrity. I'd hate to take a bite out of you. You're a cookie full of arsenic. I'd hate to take a bite out of you. You're a cookie full of arsenic. We were talking off the air, and I thought this was interesting because it showed what a PR guy does. We mentioned the whole Aflac scandal with me, and you said something interesting about that, the way it ended. Yeah, it ended dramatically, and I'm sure it was very painful to

you. No, I'm sure it is. I mean, but the main thrust of everything creative I've ever done is that a problem is a solution in disguise.

On the film that I did for Fred Roos and Jack Nicholson, they did it in the Philippines. It was a $200,000 movie of which everybody would take money off. They had $80,000 to make the movie. And so he said, we're doing this film in the Philippines. It has to be a war movie. We have this great Japanese actor who's going to be in it.

So I wrote the script for a Japanese general who involves himself somehow. And then I get a – in those days, you got telegrams. It was telegrams that can't get the Japanese guy in the country. You need new script by Friday. And I was frozen. I didn't know what to do. And about three days into that seven days write, I realized that drama is creating a problem

and then finding a good solution for it. And the tougher the problem, the better the solution. So I think what happened was that Aflac thing made people think of you and actually it separated you from it. You know, you were, for a while that's how people saw you. But they were forced now to see you that

that was just an act that you did. That's one character that you did. And I think it was good for you. Oh, wow. Negative is energy. You know, so how are you? Happy.

Oh, okay. That's pretty boring. How are you? Oh, God, you can't believe what's happening. That's interesting. I want to hear that story. Way to put a positive spin on it. Wow.

Okay, everyone on the show, shut up. We have to talk about something else. Yes. And now everyone on the show, shut up. We have to talk about something else. Yes. And now back to the show. Now here, I'm going to put you on the spot. Okay. I'm your client.

I'm accustomed to it. Huh? You're my client, yeah. I just want to see how your mind works. I'm your client. I was just doing drugs with a transsexual hooker in a motel, and she OD'd. It's all over the internet. He's not a fixer.

Yeah. He's not a studio fixer. Yeah, but you have to do some kind of spin. It's all over the internet, all over TV. Now, so I call you up. What can you do for me? Okay, I'm going to find a place where you can do an emotional breakdown because you're so distraught over this. It's going to be the

greatest acting job of your life. People are going to have such affection for you. Oh my God, let's make sure that he doesn't commit suicide. No, you find a way. Negative has energy. Negative has energy and positive is bland and blah. I just want to ask you about Tony Curtis since you brought him up. Tony Curtis and James Mason both asked you to put false. They enjoyed having you put false items in the press about them. Yeah, they were the only guys that understood how the game was played. guys that understood how the game was played. Those are the only guys. No, Tony had a career almost like

a woman's career. You know, women have short careers in Hollywood of stardom, of real stardom. Catherine Hepburn goes on and is Catherine Hepburn forever. I handle a lot of actresses who've been in the business. Jacqueline Bissett, I mean, she just won a golden

gold a year or so ago. Her career is still very bright, but of course, her beauty is not reduced whatsoever. But women, by and large, have trouble staying stars beyond 15 years. That's just how it is. Guys, not so much. You know, Harrison Ford is there, and Robert De Niro is riding all the glory of all those years.

And Tony was so beautiful. It was almost like a woman's – of course, he was a great comedic actress, comedic actor. But an actress too because of Some Like It Hot. He was one of the three actresses in the film. He, Jack Lemmon, and Marilyn Monroe. But he understood that you can only play the stardom so far. Then you have to make fun of it.

And so he would – I remember I was in this interview. It was a guy named John Foreman who went on to produce Pritzy's Honor. And he became pretty big. He was a guy named John Foreman who went on to produce Pritzy's Honor and he became pretty big. He was a great guy. And so he was out at an interview that Tony was doing at NBC. And Milton comes over and joins the lunch. And so the writer is saying, well, Tony, I know that you were born in the Bronx and you grew up. And Tony says, are you kidding?

I was born in Rhode Island. I lived in this fabulous mansion. I just made up this story so that people would think that. And Milton's playing along with it. And John Forbes sitting there saying, am I going crazy? You're Bernie Schwartz. But he played it, and he played it great. And James would have me write terrible things. They didn't have the tabloids yet.

There was a stream of really awful stories that were coming out of some guy in Long Island. And James would have me send terrible stories that he was there with part of a group of perverts that did this and that. And he would chortle over it. Bizarre. You came to do an impression of James Mason after a while, didn't you? It's in the book. You would call him up and do James Mason to him? I can do it to him.

I can't do it to you guys. No, but what I did, I saw Pat Collins was the hip hypnotist. One time she – we were someplace in Hollywood. I remember Pat Collins. You remember her? Yes. Remember her? Celebrity hypnotist?

Yeah. So she brought the guy up on the stage and says, you're James Mason. She says, James, say your speech for us from Julius Caesar. And he said, I don't want to. He became James Mason. He was James Mason. And he said exactly what James was. And wait, can I use an off-color word?

Of course. No, we insist. Okay. So James was delighted in playing all kinds of terrible, terrible tricks on you. Just awful. One time he sent me all these terrible postcards, wherever he was. This one is very beautiful, a woman's beautiful derriere on a moonlit beach. And it says, Dear Dick, thinking of you, the wind caresses my body as your fingers have.

And my wife is convinced that this is a letter from some woman. I said, it's obviously from James Mason. So I always wanted to get back at him. So I find out he's at the Bel Air Hotel. I called the Bel Air Hotel and say, I have room 102. And there actually was 102. And she says, who may I say is calling? I says, it's James Mason.

And so he picks up the phone. Yes, Mr. Mason, how can I help you? And when I'm talking to him, I can really give it right back to him. I'm doing it. And then there's this pause, and he says, Gutman, you prick. Well, you know, Dick, you're in luck. Gilbert happens to do a great James Mason. You want to do a little for Dick, his old friend?

Check it out. old friend check it out yes from from this moment on you remember nothing of joe pendleton it's your destiny oh my god that's so close because you know i didn't think of it but he did have those kind of octave changes in his voice. It was incredible what you did there. Yeah, and we just saw it. I had, we were talking about Turner Classic Movies and the honor of being a guest programmer. So I recently arranged for them to acknowledge, Warren Beatty has Rules Don't Apply.

It's a terrific movie. Actually, it's a terrific movie. He finally got his Howard Hughes movie after all these years. He did. He did. And he did it well. His performance is just really beautiful. And so I was talking to Turner Collective Movies,

and they decided they would have an evening, which they did a couple days ago, three days ago, where they would show there are only three movies in which the creator was given four nominations for the same film. One was Citizen Kane, Orson Welles, best actor, best director, best writer, best film, and Warren for Reds and Warren for Heaven Can Wait. And so they had those three films on together to show what Oscars can do. And Warren was intrigued with it and he did interviews with Ben Mankiewicz for it. So I was working.

I asked my wife to turn it on. It started like a five in the afternoon. I said, just watch it for me. I just want to make sure that it comes out well. And I get home and she's watching the film. She watched it all the way through. She'd seen it, you know, ten times before. Oh, it's great.

Heaven Can Wait is wonderful. And you worked on several of Beatty's films. You worked on Shampoo and Bonnie and Clyde, another film that was kind of ignored by Jack Warner. Well, Bonnie and Clyde. The only one that people don't know about was called Mickey One that he did with Arthur Penn. Oh, where he's a comedian. Yeah, and really good at it. Yeah, sure.

For some reason, it just didn't work. It was so – it was arch. It was, you know, it was an art farm as opposed to a straight dramatic movie. But it had some of the greatest lines and it was a wonderful movie. I loved that. And you worked on Dick Tracy, which I bring up because Gilbert auditioned for the role of Mumbles. Yes. I auditioned for the role of Mumbles. And Warren Beat, really? I auditioned for the role of Mumbles,

and Warren Beatty himself is saying, oh, you'd be great for this. You're just perfect for this. Anything you want to do with this, we just want you. And then all of a sudden I find out from my agent, I go, so when am I doing this movie? And he goes, oh, they're not doing Going With You.

And I said, who are they going with? And he goes, Dustin Hoffman. And I thought, I wonder when my name and Dustin Hoffman were running neck and neck. Let me tell you what I know about Warren. I've never heard him. He's never lied to me. And we've been together for well over 50 years. He's never lied to me.

And his enthusiasms are real. So whatever he was feeding you on, that was real. But, you know, if – who knows how that came about. But the studio is certainly going to say, this guy just won the Academy Award last year. Of course. Well, I – I have to tell you, I went to the night that Mumbles and Big Boy, who was Al Pacino. Yeah, Al Pacino.

They had this one scene together. There were about 30 takes. Every take was funnier than the last. It was astonishing. They weren't the same. They kept changing. Wasn't Hoffman doing a Robert Evans impression in part as Mumbles? Oh, my God.

That I never thought of before. I'd heard that. What I've always said about that incident was like the only way my name and Dustin Hoffman's name were ever in the same sentence is I've seen Gilbert Gottfried's acting and he's no Dustin Hoffman. Well, but they didn't see you doing Mumbles. Yeah. I'm sure Warren saw something really good that was happening there. But then I can understand Disney saying Al Pacino and Justin Hoffman. Oh, absolutely. Absolutely.

Get me mumbles. Hello, mumbles. What was about you? Where is Lips Man? I don't know. I don't know. How about Rumbles? What right have they ever taught me? What's about you? Where's Lips Man? I don't know. Where's Lips Man? Now, tell us about working with Kirk Douglas.

Well, Kirk was very interesting. I handled a lot of stuff with Kirk when I was at Rogers & Cowan and then we also handled them in my own companies. We handled Michael. I think he started – he was in Streets of San Francisco right about when I started my company. It would have been 72, 73. So we handled him then and then I did supervise the publicity on One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest and China Syndrome. I thought they were great movies. I think they were pretty good campaigns. I was proud of those.

And so we were close to Michael and I was at a party that – I just touch Oscar films now. I'm 83. And I was at a party that – I just touch Oscar films now. I'm 83. I'm not looking what my client list is going to be 10 years from now. So I don't do Oscar campaigns anymore but I touch them and people bring me on for a couple of ideas. And so I was – I do a lot of that for Harvey Weinstein and so he had a party every great beautiful actress in the world was at that party was for Penelope Cruz for Maria Barcelona and so among them was Catherine Zeta-Jones, and she's there. I mean, it was astonishing. You walk there, and you'd see Drew Barrymore and Cameron Diaz. I mean, just everywhere you look, there were 35 of the most beautiful women.

I've just never been to a party like that. So I was leaving, and Michael was leaving at the same time we were getting our cars. I said, you know, I'm doing a memoir. He says, well, gosh, you work for everybody. It should be terrific. I said, yeah, but you know the strange thing is I was never close to your dad. Kirk is about as cuddly as a cactus. But you respect him as much as you do.

And I said I just – as I went through my life, I kept discovering all these things I learned from Kirk. And I think he was the most persuasive and instrumental person in my life because his courage was – that chin was Kirk. That chin jutted out and what he did with Spartacus, the town was still caught up in the blacklist and he hired Dalton Trumbo as did Otto Preminger for Exodus. But those two guys were the only guys in town courageous enough to do that. And when Spartacus came out, cast notwithstanding, it was the greatest cast, it didn't do very well at the beginning. And Kirk knew that not only for his dedication to that film but his dedication to breaking the blacklist, it had to succeed. And he said, let's bring it out a second time. Nobody had ever done that.

And it was a second time around. that. And it was a second time around. And so it's actually how I sort of gotten closely involved with Kirk. I was on the set of Spartacus a lot because of Tony Curtis and Peter Ustinov, who I represented. But I didn't get close to Kirk. And Kirk was with Rodgers and Cowan but he was very much Warren Cowan's client and so Kirk says okay we're going to bring the film out again we have to do it with a great trailer

we used to then call preview we'll put the theaters before the feature film and it's going to be me explaining why I'm coming back with this thing and so it was set up and it's going to be me explaining why I'm coming back with this thing. And so it was set up and it was going to shoot 2 o'clock, 10 in the morning. Kirk calls and he says, Universal just gave me their take on this. It's nothing.

I need a new one. I need it now. So I sit down and write it. And I go out there. I was like 25 then. And he's, you know, he was a mountain, Kirk Douglas. And so I come and he's at a makeup mirror. There's two guys that are talking to him, but they're making him up.

And so I come in, I'm looking at his image in the mirror, and he says, that the immortal prose kid? And I said, we'll see. And he looks at it and he reads it, and then he looks up at me, then he reads it again. This is not going well. And they have cameras ready to shoot him. And so he looks at it again.

Then he turns around and that growl in the back of his throat, Dick, how long have you been in this business? And I knew it was a lost cause. And I said, long enough to know better than whatever you have on your mind. long enough to know better than whatever you have on your mind. And everybody was a little startled, including me. And he says, okay, go over to stage 10, tell them I'll be there in 15. That's great. He bought my belief.

Wow. You know what's great? He can still call you kid now. That's true. That's true. I think it's great that he's gone on this long. He was amazing. We just talked about him. He just turned 100, what, a couple of weeks ago? Yeah.

We just did a show about it. Yeah, and he had a major stroke and is still going. Yeah. Well, we handled him right after the stroke. His son Peter called – I think this was after – no, it was before Warren Cowan had died, but they had come apart a bit. And I remember taking him to some event for Israel, and he got up and he had this slurred speech, but he made such a powerful speech. And the slurring, what I say about a problem is a solution. When he's giving the speech, you know, Kirk Douglas can give any speech. He's Kirk Douglas. But this is Kirk Douglas climbing over this impediment and giving it. And I remember what he said is, he says, in Hebrew, there's no word for charity.

There's no word for charity. The word is the word tzedakah, but it means a gift that if somebody comes and the people try to give them the tzedakah of the tools of his trade. If he's a shoemaker, they'll try to give him a hammer and whatever. And Sadaka means the right thing. That was such a powerful philosophy. And he played a role early in your career because when you first went to Rogers & Cowan as a 19-year-old and you were working in the mailroom, you didn't really know what they did until you were told to make a delivery to somebody's house. Right. I was just looking for a job.

And I go to this place and I have no idea what the – I mean, I'd been a journalist all my life. Right, right. I was 15. I was writing high school sports for Hearst newspaper. And I was a film student. And so it's sort of the amalgam of that, those two things, those two streams of my life came together.

I had never heard of publicity. I just never had heard of it. And I thought this is some company. I don't care. I'm making deliveries and doing this. So I knock on this door and Kirk Douglas opens the door. I said, what are these guys doing? So I started reading the memos that I was delivering from one office to the other,

and I thought, boy, this is something I know how to do. There's so many wonderful stories, Dick, in the book, and I'm looking at my cards, and I'm thinking which one we should have you tell. The Ustinov-Olivier story. Oh, that was wonderful. Is fun. Oh, yeah. Tell Gilbert about that. Okay. Peter Ustinov, one of the great wits. But I have to tell you, we would have games of wit because one of the things you do a lot with clients is you drive them to interviews. Well, that's a half hour. You have to have something to say.

I remember one time I was driving Alan Arkin to an interview and I said, have you ever had a press agent before? He said, yeah, yeah, I did. I said, who is it? He said, so-and-so. I said, he's pretty good. Why did you leave him? He says, well, he just never showed up. He was always talking. It was all y yeah, I did. I said, who is it? He said, so-and-so. I said, he's pretty good. Why did you leave him? He says, well, he just never showed up. He was always talking.

It was always yada, yada, yada. You know what I mean? I said, I have nothing to say. And the fun with Alan was you couldn't make him laugh. But I said, I have nothing to say on the subject. And we drove about a block, and then he went, that was my success. Always poker-faced, Alan Arkin. Yeah.

And you worked with Cary Grant. Yeah. I was lucky. You stumble into things. When I first started my own business, I didn't know if I could make my own salary. But a friend of mine, Leslie Stevens, was a famous writer for Playhouse 90, and he believed in me. And he says, I'm doing a new series for Warner Brothers, and I want you on. And he got me a salary that paid my salary. So

it made it possible for me to start my business. And in the show was Hugh O'Brien, who's one of the stars. Oh, we just lost him. We just lost him. It was a big loss. People don't know. Oh, he did so much work for the Hugh O'Brien Youth Organization, has never had less than three kids in the White House in some capacity.

He opened doors for kids, thousands and thousands. I didn't know he was such a philanthropist until I read your book. Well, that's one of the reasons I wanted to write the book, to let people know things they didn't know. Because it's important to know about that. And so he was – he and Cary Grant were on the board of Fabergé, the famous cosmetics company, perfume and cosmetics. And Cary was on it. And so he arranged for us to handle Fabergé. Kerry was on the board.

He was a spokesperson. And so George Barry, who's the head of Fabergé, paid us to do Kerry's publicity. I mean, so suddenly I'm starting a new company and one of our clients is Kerry Grant. It was a pretty good start for a company. Pretty cool. But it was fun handling him because he was – they were all decisively individualistic. And one thing Cary was was incredibly truthful. And so he calls one morning and he says, Dick – two syllables.

Dick, this is Kerry. I don't know who he's calling. And he says, do you know this fellow from United something, Vernon somebody? I said, yeah, Vernon Scott, United Press International. He says, I wonder if he would do a story for you. He says, I have a problem. What's the problem, Kerry? Well, this is a woman's magazine.

They quoted me as saying I never loved any of my wives. I said, well, that's really rude. Did you ever say that or something like it? He says, yes, like it. Yes, I did. I said, what was it? He says, I once said I never left any of my wives. They all left me.

And I said, I think I could get Verdon to do a story on this. But he was a guy who was so intent on telling the truth, the greatest romantic figure of that century he was. And he was – he wanted to tell the truth. There's a story in the book too. And I, which is another reason I urge people to get the book. There's a great story, a touching story about Cary Grant and Lawrence Harvey.

Oh yes, yes, yes. That one is touching. I, I, it was hard to write through the tears on when I was writing that story. I would urge people to pick up the book and read that story.

But quickly, tell us the Ustinov story with Olivier. Okay. So I'm on the set with Peter, and I make a point of going out there. I worked with Olivier later on The Entertainer, but he's a mythic figure. Sure. I wanted to see the scene. And so it was a simple scene. Peter was the man who ran the school for gladiators and Olivier was this powerful Roman senator.

And I can't remember the subject of the scene. I think he wanted to buy one of – he wanted to buy Kirk actually, one of the gladiators. And they have this discussion and Olivier would take every scene and just simply saying, who is this man? He would say, who is this man? And Peter would say, he's Spartacus. And they were playing off against it. They were hamming it up so incredible. Two of the

greatest eagles in the world. But what a scene that was. Of course, it wasn't in the film. And Stanley Kubrick, who was the director, let them play that scene. He knew that they were goofing it up. And he was interested in it. It didn't get in the film.

He never said cut. He never said, come on, guys. He said, at the end of it, he says, thank you, guys. What a great thing for you to witness. I understand. Informed. Spartacus once trained under your auspices. Yes.

In fact, if it isn't too subversive to say so, I made him what he is today. You must be congratulated indeed. And I too, as it happens, since you're so admirably qualified to give me what up to now I've not been able to obtain, a physical description of Spartacus. Oh, yes. qualified to give me what up to now I've not been able to obtain physical description of Spolagos. oh yes but you saw him. what? in the ring. when? when you visited my school with those two charming ladies.

I trust they're both in good health. I want to hear the Cary Grant, Lawrence Harvey story. Yeah, he can tell it. Yeah. Okay. Well, Lawrence Harvey, people may not know Lawrence Harvey, but if you see Manchurian, Larry, he's one of the great actors and he was one of the great royal Shakespeare theater actors in England. And we met when he first came over here to do Richard I. He was my first client and became a lifelong friend.

I mean his lifelong. Not short. It was too short. Not short. It was too short. And Larry, as part of our work for Fabergé, we also represented Sun Valley. That's a pretty distinguished place to represent. And I came up with the idea because Fabergé had three films they were bringing out. One of them did very well in the Oscars was Touch of Class.

And so – Oh, I like that film. It was a great movie. Yeah, Glenda Jackson. Glenda Jackson. We handled Glenda. Can you imagine the distinguished feeling you have doing that? In fact, Glenda – we were in London. I was trying to talk – I asked her for a meeting because I wanted to do an Oscar campaign

on Hedda. And she said, I'll meet you at your hotel. We're at this little tiny hotel, but they had a really nice library. So she comes over, my wife and I meet with her, and she says, nobody has seen Hedda. I said, they will. And she said, how? Well, I was going to put it on Z Channel. And of course, she got nominated because we had it on Z Channel.

Nice. And then at the hotel, because we had Glenda Jackson there, the next morning we got double the marmalade. Nice. Oh, it's a big honor. So you were in Sun Valley with Cary Grant and Lawrence Harvey. So we're up there and I, yes,

I'm throwing this Fabergé Film Festival, three films that they have. And Larry is there and he's so visibly dying. He was six foot two, three. Maybe if he weighed 140 pounds, that was a lot. And he's in this sort of orange jumpsuit and it just folds around him. So one of the ways that we got the press there,

and I'm telling you we had hundreds of media who flew themselves up there for this event. And Jim Garner and Gene Hackman, we had all the great stars, because Cary Grant, the invitation came from Cary Grant, and at the end of it, he was going to do a 45-minute Q&A. And at the end of it, he was going to do a 45-minute Q&A. And we had – it was like an auditorium in a college where you go to a class. There was probably 300 people there.

And so Cary is doing it. And Larry comes in at the back and stands there. And a question is asked of Cary. And Cary says, you know, I don't really have an answer for that, but Larry is here. He just walked in. Larry, what do you think about that? So Larry, the most beautiful voice in the history of film,

untouched by his illness, responds. And so the next question comes and it's to larry and larry's standing there and carrie got up from his seat down at the stage walks up as larry's doing it stands with him takes him by the arm takes him walks him down and sits him in the chair stands behind him massaging his neck while the questions came in for Larry. It wasn't a dry eye in that house, I will tell you. He completely gave up his moment for Lawrence Harvey because he was ill. Wow. And he knew it was the last stage for Larry.

He was in the last stage of his illness. Tell us about your long friendship with an actor we've talked about on this show a lot, and that's Paul Newman. Okay. I'm not sure it was a friendship because I worked with him for about 10 years, and he spent the bulk of his life as a client of Warren Cowan, who is my teacher. Your mentor, right. Sure. Mentor and a competitor. Then at the end, when Rodgers and Cowan, who is my teacher and competitor. Then at the end, when Rogers & Cowan sold out to some other company, he was obliged to not compete for three years. But he still had Paul and Aaron Spelling and all these really good people, Kirk. And he asked me to oversee his company while I was running mine. So I was doing

both companies out of mine. And then when he was finished, he came back and he was in our office. And my wife came in and she didn't like that there were so many people. She went there, there were like eight people standing by the copying machine waiting to do it. So she went into Warren. She said, Warren, there are too many rats in the cage. He said, what do you mean? She said, well, if there's two rats, they can get along okay. But then there are too many that are snarling at each other. And he says, you mean you want me to leave?

And she said, yes. And he says, when would you like me to do so? She said, well, that depends on your interpretation of the word as soon as possible. He said, well, you know, I always thought that Richard and I would be partners. And she said, Warren, she loved him because we'd been friends for years. She said, Warren, he's going to have one partner the rest of his life and you're looking at her. Oh, that's great. Yeah.

So Paul was really, in every sense of word, Warren's client. In fact, I heard one of the most important calls I got after the book came out was Warren had died at 90 and he was still – one great thing about PR is some evidence. You can do it up until you step into the grave. And Warren, I got a call from his daughter, Bonnie, and she thanked me. She said, you got Warren. And I said, I thought it was so important to emphasize that friendship between him and Paul.

She says, well, you don't understand. On the day that he died, it's not in the book, something that she told me. On the day he died, he was in the bed, and he had lied to people and told them that Paul Newman was okay. He was on his deathbed too, although it took place like two months later. And they thought that Warren had slipped away. Phone call comes in. It's Joanne Woodward.

She said, Paul would like to talk to Warren. And so she said, Daddy, Paul's on the phone for you. And he roused up. And Paul said, just called to wish you all in a good journey. Wow. That was under the last day. So the relationship with clients can become quite tense. Warren Cowan, your boss and your mentor, is a legend too.

Married twice to the actress Barbara Rush, by the way. But also, I urge our listeners to read up on him and the history of Rodgers and Cowan. Well, I because it's the story of publicity in Hollywood in the 20th century. Yeah. And was an important story, too, because press agents, you know, Hollywood shaped how we see ourselves. Cary Grant shaped what we aspire to be in terms of charm. Gary Cooper aspired to what we wanted to be in terms of straightforward. These people represented what we aspire to, and publicity really facilitated that. I think it was really important. But what happened was when Warren died,

I asked Paul Block, another great press agent who was associated with Warren, I said, you know, is anybody trying to have a book done? He said, yes. He had notes for a book, and he said, I've been taking it to publishers, but they won't publish a book by somebody who's not going to be able to go to the book signings. So it's very hard to sell a biography by a guy who's dead.

So I started writing really fast. But I intended to write Warren's biography, which I think I could have. But as I was doing it, all these other stories started coming in. And, you know, I can't write notes because I'm dyslexic and I can't read what I write. So I have a really good memory that hooks these things. And I had – I mean this is a very big book. I never cracked another book for research while I was writing it because all I did was wander into this kind of gold mine that was my mind and picked some piece of gold off here and a piece of gold off there. It's an amazing – it's like a diary.

It's almost like you were making daily entries for 50 years. Well, I did it for five years, that's for sure. I mean it's a great read. Tell Gilbert that Paul Newman had a fondness for telling jokes but he didn't tell them well. Just terrible, Just terrible. Just terrible. Yeah. I mean, he would tell them, and we would laugh, and then he'd go away.

I mean, how far off, how rowdy can I be on this? You can be rowdy. Oh, God. We encourage it. Look, the show started off with me asking you about Milton Berle's dick. Yeah, that's true. Okay, so that was clean. You can go anywhere you want. Well, Paul, I remember once there was a party at Warren's house, and Paul's, you know, he had an audience.

He was Paul Newman. I don't know who today represents what he was. He was Tom Cruise times George Clooney times whoever. And the joke was that this guy is a bee farmer and he has these bees that he takes out and he pollinates people's things. And he has three million bees. And so this newspaper guy is sent out to talk to this guy. There's a story here.

And so he goes there and it's sort of a flat farm and there's just a house and there's like a barn. And the guy says, where are the three million bees? He says, well, they're over there in that shack. He says, three million bees in a bees? He says, well, they're over there in that shack.

He says, 3 million bees in a shack? Yeah. So they go over and the shack's empty. There's a shelf and there are three, like, four-gallon bottles sitting on it. And he says, where are the 3 million bees? He said, in the bottles. And he says, well, doesn't that, like, crush them? He says, fuck them.

That was a good joke. That's the joke. It was a good joke. Well, doesn't that like crush them? He says, fuck them. That wasn't a joke. That's the joke. It wasn't a joke. I mean, it wasn't – there was no humor there. But Paul was – and he just laughed and laughed. And then I found out that the other people – and the other thing he did he would test you because he knew he was paul newman he knew that everybody would suck up to him nobody would tell him the truth and and he made you and uh and i talked to oh my gosh i can't think of her name

was a really terrific actress who had been in a film with him. It was her first role. She's with Paul Newman. Paul gives her a tape of a show that he had done on Playhouse 90 or Studio One, one of the great one-hour live shows that they used to have on television. And she looks at it, and it's terrible. And he's unprofessional. And the next day he says, what did you think? She said, I don't know.

I couldn't get past the bad acting of the guy in the lead. Well, it cemented her relationship with him. He was putting her on. He was putting her on. No, he was testing her. Oh,

I see. He was testing if he would lie to her, he she would lie to him now you you uh worked i mean i i think you may have worked where you worked on a movie that had one of my favorite old character actors john mcgyver yeah on love in the afternoon oh yeah love in the afternoon we got you were a kid you were 22 i was yeah i was 22 when he started that and uh i do remember because i'd never seen him before and there's the scene where he comes in to find his wife in the middle of a lovemaking with carrie with gary cooper and then he goes to the phone he says um and he finds out that Audrey's there she's inserted herself to save this woman's life and Audrey Hepburn and uh he goes to the phone he says

uh do you have another room 11 22 no um is there possibly a room 2211? No. Is this the Ritz Hotel? It was nothing. Billy Wilder had him do it about four times, and he did it differently each time, and I was just amazed at how great an actor he was. Kindly disconnect yourself from my wife. I beg your pardon?

Over there, where the light is better. Do we know each other? Only by proxy. I am the foolish husband. Whose foolish husband? Her foolish husband. My foolish husband? Josephine?

Well, is this lady your wife? Did you remind Frank Flanagan? Yes. Is this Sweet Fourteen? Yes. Then she must be my wife. Are you? I don't think so.

This is all very confusing. May I use your phone? Right ahead. Help yourself. Hello? Give me the concierge. And Billy loved those guys. Those character actors? Oh, he loved them.

Yeah. So did I. I mean, they were the reason Hollywood, the golden age of Hollywood is golden. Yeah, well, you talk about it. You say it's over, the golden age of Hollywood. So tell us why you say that. I mean, obviously, a lot of people would agree with you. Let me tell you, I took the first three chapters because I wasn't sure if i was writing anything and i showed them to warren baity warren's a big part of the book

yeah i mean there's nobody in the business who's smarter than he is and um really kinder he's really a kind guy and he read it and he said know, you're making a false assumption here. He says, I know you're saying that we were greater. He says, we weren't better actors. We weren't more handsome. The system changed. I said, that's why I'm writing the book. Well, you say that Hollywood no longer has the ability to generate legends. I don't think they do. Well, first place, we've destroyed primacy in terms of celebrity. I mean, where do the celebrities come? They're coming from the reality television. I mean, think of where's Paris Hilton now?

But at the time, she was the number one star. the number one star. And what gets me is with the internet, you know, years ago, you couldn't communicate with Clark Gable or Charlie Chaplin. It was mystery. Yeah. And now everybody has access to every celebrity. Right. Well, I have two minds of that. I mean I'm very much a creature of my century. I mean I'm not very good with the computer. My staff has to help me. I really don't know a lot about social media. Our company does it as well as anybody else because I have these young people that are terrific.

But I resent greatly how everything has devolved. It's gotten worse instead of better, and it's because people have access, and they have it for a different reason. I handled Elizabeth until she died, Taylor, and she was always beset by, her whole life she was beset by gossip. And with the coming of the tabloids and then with the internet, it was pretty bad. And they were always – for a number of years, the media couldn't wait for her to die.

And to the point that at one point, and it was bad for her. First place, she was running the HIV, the Elizabeth Taylor AIDS Foundation. It was really important for her vivacity and the fact that she was still involved to be aware, people should be aware of that. But also she had a great perfume and that anticipation of her death constant was bad. And so I had suggested that we do Larry King. And I call Larry and he said, oh, I'll do anything. We'll come to the house.

We can cut around it. If she has any bad thing, we cut it out. I said, no, Larry, I want her to be at the studio live and people can see how vital she is. She was one of the sassiest people there ever was. And so we do that. And she was great on the show. And the next day, I get a call from a news reporter on CNN. Do you have a number where you can be reached this weekend? I said, you mean in case Elizabeth Taylor dies? And she said, yes.

I said, do you not watch your own network? She was on last night. Robin Williams couldn't have been more vital than she was. Doesn't that mean something? No, they didn't want to miss the big event. You also talk about how – I've seen you in interviews and you're talking about the year 1939. You're talking about the demise of the studio system and how in 1939 how many landmark films came out. We never see anything like that again either.

Well, if you look at the years around it, they were pretty good. All around it. 38 and 40 and 41, they were great years. Yeah, all good. But that year, there were 10 films that were nominated. Every one of them went on to become a classic, Gone with the Wind. Wizard of Oz, Gone with the Wind. Yeah, Gunga Din, Mr. Smith.

I think, is Stagecoach? I believe so. Gunga Din was that year, but it didn't get nominated. Oh, Gunga Din was Mr. Smith. I think his stagecoach. I believe so. Gunga Din was that year, but it didn't get nominated. Oh, Gunga Din was not nominated. That's right. There were 20 films after them. Jane – not Jane Eyre. Bo Jest was –

Bo Jest. Destry Rides Again. Was it Mice and Men that year, 39? Yes, Mice and Men was 39. 39? Mice and Men was year, 39? Yes, Mice and Men was 39. Mice and Men was one of the nominees, yeah. Yeah, and it kind of got buried because, I mean, look at the competition. It was insane. Stagecoach.

Well, you know, there wasn't a thing of getting buried then because it was a tsunami coming in of great movies and we expected it. And Gone with the Wind didn't get drenched by Wizard of Oz nor did Wizard of Oz with Gone with the Wind. We thought of greatness and we expected greatness. But there were – after those 10 films, I mean it was Wuthering Heights and Mr. Smith Goes to Washington. I know. The list goes on. Goodbye, Mr. Chips. I mean it was Weathering Heights and Mr. Smith Goes to Washington. Goodbye, Mr. Chips. I mean incredible films. And then there were 20 films of brilliance, of really incredible brilliance that didn't get nominated that year. And that's what you expect.

And when I came into the industry, it was the end of the studio system, the contract system. And everybody was saying, oh, Hollywood's going to fly now because the stars can – we won't have Jack Warner and Louis B. Mayer and Adolf Zucker and these guys sitting on the Harry Cohn telling them what to do. Those guys were monsters. I mean I was around some of them and they – Goldwyn wasn't – Goldwyn was very charming actually. But they knew their power and they exerted their power. But the one thing was they wanted to make good movies

and they got directors that made good movies and they got stars to put them in. Hollywood was great because those guys set the table. And then suddenly when they were gone, people would come in with their own films. They weren't that good. Yeah, because I remember like Betty Davis said in an interview that their studio heads, I mean, they were bastards and they all came from non-show business. And they were like basically clothing salesmen. Yeah, the schmata salesmen.

Yeah. And shoes, mostly shoes. Yeah. But they knew how to make a great movie. Yes, they did. Yeah. They did. And they inspired some of them.

I mean Sam Goldwyn right after the, read an article about the difficulty of guys coming back and adjusting. And he decided, he said, he'd set someone down to write Best Years of Our Lives, one of the greatest films of all time. Dick, you've lived the life, my friend. Well, I still have a little to go, I think. There's stories in the book we didn't even get to. There's a story about a party. Gilbert would love this. You walked into a party. Bobby Darin was on the piano.

Dean and Sammy were singing. And Sal Mineo and Marlon Brando were playing the bongos. Wow. I love that one. Wow. Another time you were at a party with Tony Randall, Vince Edwards, and you were screening a movie with Groucho. Yeah. You know, we didn't even a movie with Groucho. Yeah.

You know, we didn't even get to that. You met Harpo. You met Orson Welles. Yeah. No, it was a life. I have no complaints about my life. It was wonderful. And I don't have any envy of the fact that I helped other people to fame.

I never wanted it. I mean, I'm doing this because I really was looking forward to the conversation. Yeah, as we were. I do love, I love talking about it. I mean I'm doing this because I really was looking forward to the conversation. Yeah, as we were. I do love – I love talking about it. I love talking about the book. What were Groucho and Harpo like? Well, Harpo I can't tell you because I only – I only met him once. I was handling a charity and one of his paintings was being auctioned.

It was quite beautiful and a very floral scene. And so I had somehow connected with him. And then I get a call. He said, this is Harpo Marx. I had never spoken to him. And he said, I'm going to Israel and I'd like to do something. I said, well, I'd like to do that for you, Mr. Marx, but how do I know that you're Harpo Marx? I've never heard you speak.

Could have been James Mason pranking you. But then I asked him about a question. The greatest memoirist of all time was Oscar Levant, and he was full of Harpelmark stories. And so I asked him about one of the stories, and he answered correctly, so I took care of him. There's so many stories in the book, and we urge our listeners to pick up Star Flacker. What is it, 670 pages, Dick?

670. Incredible. They fly past you. They fly past. Inside the golden age of hollywood there's stories about jackie beset and oh it's people we didn't get to like i said groucho and oh and frank and i were talking about this that christopher plumber hated sound of music he called it the sound of mucus and i I was afraid to say that. No, I was afraid to put it in the book. And then suddenly, the LA Times did a story and they mentioned that. Oh, God, now I can

do it. I can't get sued. We handled while he was doing that. And he fought me on all the publicity. Although I got one gift from him. So we burned down in 93. So this was the thing I really loathed losing. He did a Hamlet and it didn't get good reviews. But Gisela, my wife and I, really loved it. And so we sent him a telegram about that. And he sent one back and it says, Dear Dick and Gisela, thank you for your note.

It pleased me greatly. See you on my return. Chris. Except they added a letter. So it said, Dear Dick and Gisela, thank you for your letter. Cheer me greatly. See you on my return. Christ.

He added that to me. You also, I mean, there's so many people in the book that we didn't get to tony randall and mickey rooney and william holden and you knew you were friends with david jansen we'll we'll talk to you again dick and we'll cover that stuff that would be great i really enjoy this and i'm really interested in the audience that you that you bring to this well you know this show is about celebrating old Hollywood. This is our 138th episode. I have a lot of good clients that I'm going to throw your way.

Oh, we'd be thrilled. Oh, great. We'd be thrilled. Jackie's really had a new zenith in her career. She's doing all kinds of good movies. We're fans. Yeah. Yeah, Jackie Bissett. Particularly the deep.

I know where you're going with that. You know, her allure is still exactly the same. Actually, I invited her to his premiere and I think it was Benjamin Buttons. So she gets there and the first rank of the photographers is shooting Jennifer Lopez. And so Jennifer Lopez, they finish, and then she goes down, and I start to bring Jackie forward. But they're still shooting Jennifer Lopez. And I said to Jackie, you know what? Their sail shot is going to be her from the side. They need to have something that shows the dairy here, which it turned out to be.

And Jackie says, I think I've lost some of my allure. I said, no, just wait a second. And they finish and she turns the corner and suddenly, Jackie, Jackie, Jackie. You know, all the photographers are calling her over. The next time we talk, Dick, too, I want to ask you about, I mean, you witnessed Hollywood at its highest point. I mean, and all the old restaurants and clubs. I want to ask you about next time we talk about Romanoff's and Billy Wilder's restaurant, the Bistro and Ciro's and all of that stuff, too. Most of all, the Hollywood Brown Derby. That's where I'm the Brown Derby and Jason.

But my daughter has an apartment building that's on the side of the Hollywood Brown Derby. Wow. It's very famous. Sixteen hundred vine. Yeah, sure. an apartment building that's on the side of the Hollywood Brown Derby. Wow. It's very famous, 1600 Vine. Yeah, sure. And I said to her, you know, you're obligated to help me celebrate and bring Hollywood back to Hollywood. So she hosts, 1600 Vine hosts the Made in Hollywood honors that we have every Oscar.

Any film that's nominated for the Oscars that was made here, there aren't many, Any film that's nominated for the Oscars that was made here, there aren't many, is accorded the – Los Angeles City Council gives the Maiden Hollywood Honor. And the same thing for Emmy-nominated television fare. But that all takes place. And everybody is very aware this was where the Brown Derby – this is where Lucille Ball stalked William Holden. Sure. When I got out to L.A., everything was gone. I mean, I went to Nick Adele's, and of course, Musso's was still there,

but the Derby was gone, and Jason's was all but gone. It's sad. It's really a lost era. What's in the book? Yes. I tried to guess. The book is Starflacker. Gil?

Yes. I want to take them for a walk through Hollywood. Starflacker, Inside the Golden Age of Hollywood by Dick Gutman. Not Casper Gutman. Yeah. I like talking to a man who likes to talk. I handled a lot of John Huston's films. And the last one, we had arranged for him to get the Santa Fe Film Festival Award.

And so we had a press conference for him about that, the last press conference he did. And at the festival, they were going to have a ball where you came as so, Mr. Gutman, what do you plan to do? How do you plan to attire yourself at the ball? I said, with my driver's license. He said, yes, yes, of course. You knew them all, Dick. You knew them all. They were all great.

You're a cookie full of arsenic, Sidney. Dick, I'll send you some links to some episodes of this show I think you'll get a kick out of. Yeah. No, I'm anxious to have some on my people. This is fun. Yeah, it's a thrill for us. So thanks for doing it. And his book again is... It is fun. Yeah, it's a thrill for us. So thanks for doing it. And his book again is...

It's there. Yeah, Starflacker. That's it. Inside the Golden Age of Hollywood. Thank you so much, Dick. How much fun this was. Thank you. Thank you, Dick.

We'll see you again, okay? Bye-bye. Thank you. you thank you dick we'll see you again okay bye bye thank you hey you made the mistake of not turning off your podcast in time so now you have to hear this cross promotion for hello from the magic tavern a weekly podcast in the magical land of foon hosted by me a human from chicago and me usador wizard of the 12th realm of aphesius and me chunt i'm a shapeshifter but i'm mostly a badger but i guess i've also been an alligator and a tiny horse with a top hat if you want to fully improvise comedy fantasy epic this is the show for you you can start at the beginning and binge your way all the way up to episode 100 or honestly just jump in on a new episode it's not the wire you'll get it i join us and we shall entertain thee hour after hour

or and or also speaking of the wire who's stringer bell again wait which one whistles i don't want to talk about earth stuff