Gilbert Gottfried's Amazing Colossal Podcast - 160. Richard Benjamin

Episode Date: June 19, 2017

Gilbert and Frank welcome actor-director Richard Benjamin for an enlightening and thoroughly entertaining discussion about his six-decade career in Hollywood as well as his memories of working with Woody Allen, Mel Brooks, Clint Eastwood, Mike Nichols and Orson Welles. Also, James Mason pulls a fast one, Walter Matthau plays the ponies, Johnny Guitar meets Lawrence of Arabia and Richard helms a comedy classic ("My Favorite Year"). PLUS: The genius of Michael Crichton! The brilliance of Buck Henry! George Burns orders soup! Richard pursues Albert Finney! And Gilbert sings the theme from "Goodbye Columbus"! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

That's the sound of unaged whiskey transforming into Jack Daniel's Tennessee whiskey in Lynchburg, Tennessee. Around 1860, Nearest Green taught Jack Daniel how to filter whiskey through charcoal for a smoother taste, one drop at a time. This is one of many sounds in Tennessee with a story to tell. To hear them in person, plan your trip at tnvacation.com. Tennessee sounds perfect. Hi, this is Gilbert Gottfried, and I'm here with my co-host, Frank Santopadre, and this is Gilbert Gottfried's amazing, colossal podcast, where once again, recording at Nutmeg with our engineer, Frank Ferdarosa. Our guest this week is an accomplished director of film and television, and one of the most

versatile and recognizable actors of the last six decades. You've seen him on TV shows like Mad About You, Titus, Ray Donovan, Saturday Night Live, Children's Hospital, the Buck Henry-created series Quark, and the situation comedy He and She, co-starring his longtime spouse, Paul Apprentice. His film work includes memorable roles in Catch-22, Goodbye Columbus, Westworld, The Last of Sheila, Diary of a Mad Housewife, The Sunshine Boys,

House Calls, Love at First Bite, The Last Married Couple in America, and Disconstructing Harry. Or Deconstructing Harry. Oh and Disconstructing Harry. Or Deconstructing Harry. Oh, Disconstructing. He's been celebrated for his work behind the camera,

directing popular features such as Racing with the Moon, City Heat, Mermaids, Little Nikita, The Money Pit, and a film we've discussed at length on this very podcast, My Favorite Year. In a long and prolific career he's worked with and alongside George Burns, Sidney Poitier, George Burns, Sidney Poitier, Mike Nichols, Walter Matthau, Peter O'Toole, Mel Brooks, Sean Penn, Woody Allen, Clint Eastwood, Neil Simon, Steven Spielberg, Shirley MacLaine, and Tom Hanks, to just name a few. And if that wasn't impressive enough, he also joins a select group of our guests to have met the legendary Buster Keaton. Please welcome to the podcast one of our favorite actors

and a man who once turned me down for a part in the film My Stepmother is an Alien. The multi-talented Richard Benjamin. Thank you, Gilbert. When did that happen? When did I turn you down? Yes, I actually went out and auditioned. I think I flew to L.A. What was the matter with me?

Yeah. What was the part? What was wrong with me? Were you the stepmother of the alien? I think I was one of those parts like the best friend of somebody. Probably Dan Aykroyd's best friend. Well, I apologize for that. I don't know if I accept that. Although it's not going to change anything.

Yeah. But just so I can throw this in, I did see a review of my stepmother as an alien, which said, not as terrible as most people say it is. Those are always, love those those those are my favorite kind because there's nothing in there that you can hold on to nothing if i go to paula and say look there's a positive well it's not quite positive richard we were talking before we turned the mics on and you are a New Yorker like us you're from you're from the Upper West Side I am we're coming to you from West 45th Street right now and you were great you were telling us you went way back with one of our recent guests Tony Roberts

Tony Roberts yeah we've been friends for a long time we met at school at Northwestern and I went to the High School of Performing Arts right near you on 46th Street. It's now combined with another school, but it was pretty amazing. You did indeed. Your parents weren't in the business, but you hadn't. Gilbert finds this interesting, and I did too. We both realized you had an uncle in Vaudeville. Well, I had an uncle in Vaudeville named Joe Browning, and when I was working with George Burns in The Sunshine Boys, he would ask me to go to lunch every single day at MGM. And we would walk between these two giant sound stages. And he would always say, kid, you want to have lunch with me? And, you know, this was like a dream come true.

George Burns is saying, hey, kid, you want to have lunch with me? And we'd walk along those stages. And he'd tell me this joke that he told me every single day it's the same joke every day for three months and i laughed every single time he ordered the same thing from the same waitress every single day and it looked to me like this waitress had been there since silent movies and she said oh hello mr burns hello helen how are you fine i would like some soup yes mr burns and i would like it to be hot yes mr burns do you know how hot i would like it no mr burns i would like it so hot that you can't carry it that was and and i laughed every single day for for three months because it was him.

But he, I said, do you know my uncle? He said, why? I said, he was in vaudeville. He said, what was his name? And I said, Joe Browning. He said, well, he said, your uncle was a headliner and Gracie and I were on the bill with him. uncle was a headliner and Gracie and I were on the bill with him and uh he was a headliner and we were down on the bill and he said um I know his act I said you know it's like yeah you want to hear it and he did my uncle's act sitting there in the commissary at MGM. That's great. And then later, when I, well, later I found a recording

in Argentina of my uncle doing his act. Somebody, in fact, it was my son-in-law said, well, have you ever looked him up? And I said, no. He said, well, why don't you, you know, there's an internet now. And I said, oh yeah. So I punched his name in and there was a recording in an archive in Argentina of my uncle. And I got it and got it transferred because it was on like an old 78 or something. And I got it transferred and out of the place in Culver City. and out at a place in Culver City. And my wife and I, in the parking lot, put this thing into the CD player of the car. And sitting there in that parking lot,

I'm hearing my uncle's act. And about two miles away, it was the act that George Burns did for me at MGM. It's just completely amazing. That is cool. And another actor, another great star from the Sunshine Boys, what do you remember about Walter Matthau? Oh, Walter.

Walter, well, for one thing, he was the godfather of our daughter. Walter, besides being a great actor, Walter was the most wonderful man, the most lovely person you could possibly be with. And I learned a great deal from him, not only about, you know, acting and stuff, but how to be a person. And he, Charlie is his son. And before we had kids, I saw how Walter and Carol were with their son, Charlie. They just loved him so much that he couldn't stand it anymore. And I said to Paula, that's the way we're going to be. We're going to be like that. And that is what we did. Oh, and you decided to become parents because you were inspired by.

Well, it wasn't the only thing. Well, I mean. Yeah. But it was part of the it was part of it and seeing what unconditional love does to a kid you know and we decided well we'll just have to be be that way yeah a great a great great man gilbert does a pretty fair walter mathau impression yeah you want to give a little walter Matthau for Richard? It's not the Belasco Theater. It's the Morasco Theater. Just say, knock, knock, knock.

Great. You also have to, as long as we're talking about Matthau, you should really tell that that story is wonderful about you and Walter doing house calls and you asking him if he was going to do any prep for his character. Oh, yeah. Yeah. So we're doctors. And I said, well, we we have to we have to, you know, we're we're operating on people. We're surgeons. And he said, yeah. So I said, we have to see an operation. He said, what for? So he said, I said, because we have to know how to handle the scalpel. We have to know what operation he said what for so he said i said because we have to know how to handle the scalpel we have to know what it looks like you know when real doctors are operating he said let

me let me ask you something do you think that people i'm walter mathau you know do you think that people are going to think i became a doctor to be in this movie. I said, I don't know, but I'm telling you that we have to go see an operation. Well, he had a good friend, a heart surgeon, and he said, all right, we're going to go out there and watch an operation. Is that what you want to do? I said, yeah. So we go out to this place, which is not far, actually, from Hollywood Park, which I later found out, which is why he knew so well where this was. And we get there, and they're saying, okay, you people have to suit up. And gets all the sterilized things.

And he said, I'm not doing this. I said, what? He says he said, I'm not doing this. I said, what? He says, no, I'm not doing that. He said, I don't think you should do it either. I said, come on, we have to do this. He said, no, you go in there. I got to make a phone call. And what I hear him as he's, I'm suiting up,

and he's making a phone call, and it's something about an exactor in the third race and it's something about the fourth race pick this one i said what's he doing he's making a bet or something anyway i go inside and uh they say um have you ever seen an operation before and i said no no no and they said well you might want to sit down And I said, no, no, no. And they said, well, you might want to sit down. And I said, no, no, no, no. I have to observe this. I have to see what this is like.

So I'm standing over this person, and doctor makes an incision straight down the guy's chest, almost to his navel. Now, the next thing that I remember is i see linoleum i'm lying flat out on the floor i don't see any of that i just see the floor and this nurse comes over to me and she rolls me over and she says so what was this, your first opening? And I said, you know, I was confused. I said, well, I've opened on Broadway, and I've opened in some shows.

No, no, no. Was this the first time you've seen anything? I said, yeah. She said, we told you to sit down. So then she says, well, maybe you better lie here for a few minutes because we do have a patient here that's under anesthesia. We have some work to do and you probably don't want to see the closing. So afterwards they take me out in a wheelchair because I can't even stand after what I've seen and they wheel me out there and Walter is standing there and he's still on the phone and he said,

what the hell happened to you so i said well i watched part of it he said so you didn't learn anything right i said no i don't think so and he said you didn't learn anything and i made three thousand dollars on the phone here oh that hurts and art carney was in house calls with you. Art, yes. What was Art Carney like? We haven't had too many. We've done 170 of these things.

I don't think we've had too many people that have worked with Art Carney, if anybody. We were trying to get Joyce Randolph. Yeah, we worked real hard to get Joyce Randolph to come on. She's here. She's local. Yes, that'd be good. We, as yet, have not convinced her. Yeah.

Lovely guy. You know, it's, you know, when, you know, working with these people who you've seen all your life. I mean, our Carney was Newt the waiter on the Maury Amsterdam show. Yep. Golden Goose or whatever that was called. It was called Silver something one time. It was called the Golden something. I can't remember.

Yeah, but in very early Dumont Television, WABD, and working with all these people, at first, you're kind of in awe because you've grown up with these people. But terrific, you know, professional, hardworking guy, but lovely to be around and stuff. I've met mostly great people. Very few of the other kind. There's a short list, and I won't tell you who's on that list, but it's short. But mostly it's people like you were saying, like Matthau and Carney and George Burns. And, you know, I've been pretty lucky that way.

Well, you're a movie fan. You were a kid who grew up on the Upper West Side, as we were talking about. You had your two neighborhood theaters. What was one, the 81st Street? RKO 81st Street and Lowe's 83rd. Right. And there was another theater, the Beacon Theater, which is now the Beacon, you know. Oh, the Beacon Theater was a movie theater?

It was a movie theater. Wow, I didn't know that. Did you know that, Gil? Oh, yeah. That's cool stuff. Yeah, it was a movie theater, and I was in there as a little kid all the time. They had even a stage show before the movie,

and I'd be in there all day long on Saturday. And there was another one on 77th Street that became, I think, a supermarket or something. But, yeah, that's where I grew up. And so later in life, and I'm doing research for this episode, and I watched The Last of Sheila with my wife, which was great. And I'm saying because I'm starting to get a sense of Richard's appreciation of these people, and you're doing these scenes with James Mason,

and he must have been one of those pinch-me kind of people. Like, what am I doing here with James Mason? You bet. And we had this big scene at the end of the movie, and James, when all the women, Diane Cannon and Raquel Welch and Joan Hackett. Right. Great cast. And we were on this great cast.

And we were on this boat. And the interior was a set. But, of course, the exterior is a real boat. And James, you know, had a very dry sense of humor. And we'd be out at sea. And he said, you know, all the women are on board. Can't you feel it? And so he said to me, do you want to have a cup of tea in the lounge on the boat? And I said, sure. Yeah. Okay. That'd be great. I mean, I get to sit down with you and we we talk and he's talking

to me and you know about a lot of different things and then i said this sounds familiar with this conversation what i said holy crap this is tomorrow's scene i said we're rehearsing he slipped into it and it became a rehearsal that's well it was amazing because unlike most of the time you know you're working with an actor and you know when that actor's mouth stops you talk he talks then you talk but here it was completely real and even though i knew all the lines and stuff, I didn't have to think about any of them because we were in this kind of zone of some kind of real thing. And then the next day we did the scene, and it was like magical working with him.

So I thought, you know, he is probably certainly one of the greatest movie actors that ever was. And, I mean, you think about Lolita and a whole bunch of other. Oh, yeah, no question. Odd man out. Oh, man. And the list goes on. Yeah, the list goes on.

And so that was pretty magical. That was one of the greatest acting experiences I ever had in a movie. It's a terrific. You know that movie, Gilbert? The Last of Sheila? Oh, yeah. Written by Tony Perkins and Stephen Sondheim, of all people. Yeah.

And, you know, it's a great, because Stephen and Tony, who had these, played these games all through New York. I don't know if you know that they had these treasure hunts all through New York and scavenger hunt-like things and breaking up everybody in teams and stuff. And they used the city as the clues. And people would be out there in cabs and subways and stuff, and you'd go, there's a lady holding a torch for you. And you'd think, oh, it's the Statue of Liberty. And you'd zoom out to there, and there'd be a clue out there. It was all over the,

it was amazing. So they wanted to create something that you could actually, in the last of Sheila, you can play the game. You can actually figure it out. And they didn't want to have one of these things, you know, where the guy or the,

the, the detective at the end rounds everybody up and says, this is what must've happened because you couldn't have been here. And you could, the answer to the last of Sheila is in the title. and rounds everybody up and says, this is what must have happened because you couldn't have been here. The answer to The Last of Sheila is in the title. Yeah. It starts immediately, and you can actually play the game along with the people in the movie.

I got to tell our listeners to check that movie out if you haven't seen it. It's a lot of fun. And what was Raquel Welch like to work with? Oh, I know where you're going. What was she like? She was good. You know,

she was fine. Uh, uh, we, we had, uh, we had a bomb scare there and, um,

and we didn't know it, but we had bodyguards and we had people following us because there was some kind of group that targeted the movie and the people in it and stuff. But for a while, we didn't even know that. And so people were following. And I didn't I thought people when I I didn't know anyone was you know being security for us I never saw them or anything but I saw people following Raquel and I thought well that's just I don't know of course sure why not follow Raquel that's a good idea and uh but later I realized they were you know people that were concerned about our security and stuff. Wow.

But she was great. She was great. Who were these people who were? Well, it's interesting. It's interesting. I think it might have been Black September. I'm not, I can't quite remember. You remember that group?

No, I don't. You know Black September? No, that wasn't the one with Hirsch, was it? No, you're thinking of the SLA, Patty Hirsch. No, no don't. You know Black September? No, that wasn't the one with Hirsch, was it? No, you're thinking of the SLA, Patty Hearst. No, no, no. This, I think it was. But the interesting thing is we had a partly Israeli crew, and we thought this was all not fun, but we didn't take it seriously.

And they came to us and said, you have to pay attention to this. You people don't realize how serious this is. The Israelis knew that there was no fooling around with this. Were you in the south of France? We were shooting in Nice and Cannes all through there. But everything was fine. Terrific, fun movie. We'll be back to the show after these important messages.

Gilbert and Frank. They're the ones that you can thank. And now back to the show. You know, Gilbert will appreciate this too. First, I'm going to put you on the spot and make you do a little james mason for richard yes good we might as well entertain him while we've got him here congratulations my dear i seem to have made it just in time haven't Haven't I? Well, there's no need to be so formal. I know most of you on a first-name basis. I've made a lot of money for you over the years.

Well, I'm here because I need a job. I cannot just restrict it to drama. I can do comedy as well. That's pretty damn good. What do you think, Richard? Great, Mr. Norman Maine. That's right. There you go. Yes.

He's a movie buff. Yeah, great. Excellent. Gosh, it's like he's here. But what I was getting to, and this will make Gilbert happy, is that one of- Ben, before I forget. Uh-oh. You can't be Lear't believe your phone's worth

anymore oh you do the modern day james mason from heaven can wait since you were a movie buff richard and and spending time in those theaters one person you got to work with uh the first i think it's the first project the first project for the screen that you directed, and you'll know where I'm going with this. You did a TV pilot version of Where's Papa? I did, yeah. And Gilbert will love this. Who was in the Ruth Gordon role? It was Elsa Lanchester.

Oh, geez. The Bride of Frankenstein. How about that? And it was amazing. Amazing. I mean, when you think about the people, and you mentioned Buster Keaton before. Yeah, we'll ask about him too. The people that you run across and worked with and stuff.

And she was fabulous. And Marvin Wirth produced that. And we made the pilot, and the pilot was pretty good. And he took it to ABC. We made the pilot, and the pilot was pretty good. And he took it to ABC. It was an ABC pilot. And he said, they thought it was great, but they're not going to put it on. I said, why?

And they said, because we think that mother is crazy. And I said, really? You think she's crazy because she's trying to kill her son at the beginning of the movie is that and they said we can't have any crazy mothers on abc so i said well tell them tell them she's eccentric so they said i told them she's eccentric they said we don't care we don't want any crazy people so it didn't but it it it was good for me because um i had something to show yeah uh yeah what was she like i mean and again is that a moment where you're saying oh here i'm a kid who grew up in these movie theaters and now i'm stop directing the bride of frankenstein yeah i mean it's it's out of body kind of thing you know it's

like little dreams coming true all the time uh and yet you got to make your day. You're working, you know, and you're directing these people. And it's like, it is. You're a little kid growing up in the west side of New York, and you're telling Elsa Lanchester and Sidney Poitier and Peter O'Toole and other people what to do, you know. So how did that happen? How did it happen? And you work with woody allen yeah

tell us a little about woody uh well paula made what's new pussycat oh yeah with with otul with otul in fact in fact it was paula who suggested otul to me for my favorite year. And so she knew Woody, and they're still very good friends. And so then I got a call. He asked me to be in, you know, Deconstructing Harry. And it's so amazing because everybody, you only get your scenes. You don't get the whole script. He sends you your scenes, and then nobody supposedly has a,

but Judy Davis, who I work with, and all the other people in that movie, we just give each other all of our scenes. So we finally put together a script, so we knew what it was. Did he know you were doing that? He didn't care. Oh, he didn't care.

He didn't care. He doesn't care about any of that thing. And when we start to work, and Julia Louis-Dreyfus, when we start to work, he said, you can say those words that I wrote or you can say anything you want. So we all said, you know what? We're going to say just what you wrote, or you can say anything you want. So we all said, you know what? We're going to say just what you wrote, okay? Because that's funny enough as far as we're concerned.

And he doesn't say very much, but it's a misnomer about him to think that he's aloof at all. He loves to laugh, and you see him laughing off camera, and he's funny on the set. And it's a delightful kind of experience. And now with my favorite year, I mean, the premise takes place like the making of the Sid Caesar show. Yeah. But the Peter O'Toole character, tell us where that originally comes from. That came from, this is so crazy. coming to Chicago in 1880 and a cub reporter trying to keep him from a drunken gunfighter and a cub reporter's got to keep him sober for some kind of thing in 1880. So Mel says,

I don't want to do that. Let's do this. So it becomes my favorite year. Oh, but he took the basic conceit of it. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So then, and you're absolutely right, there were no real guest stars on your show of shows. There was nobody like that.

But Norman Lear, I believe, told Mel that Errol Flynn was on the Martha Ray show. Oh, yes. And he'd been on it quite a few times, not always, let me say, steady on his feet. And she said that, and Norman told Mel that it was incredible because just to get him on the set and get him going was just an amazing bit of work. Plus, he also had the most gorgeous silk shirts he'd ever seen in his life. That kind of character.

So that's how that character got melded into the show of shows. Because as I say, they didn't really have guest stars like that. Right. Yeah. And then Norman wrote that script. Yeah. Our pal Norman Steinberg has been on this show. And only Norman wrote that script.

I don't know if he. He told us. Yep. You know, I'm telling you. And whatever you see, I won't go into it too much on that screen. and whatever you see, I won't go into it too much, on that screen in those credits, it's one of those hideous things,

but I know because I was there that it's only Norman who wrote that script with some fabulous jokes also from Mel. Oh, it's hilarious. What was Peter O'Toole like to work with? What was Peter O'Toole like to work with? O'Toole was, he was like, I mean, a consummate, it was like a thoroughbred. It was like working with a racehorse that was in top condition, which he was then. was in top condition, which he was then, and you just had to come up to his game because his game was pretty amazing.

I don't ever think I ever made more than three takes with him because it would be like howitzers, you know, shelling ships. He'd be on one side of one, then bang, he'd hit the thing right in the middle. shelling ships or he'd be on one side of one then bang he'd hit the thing right in the middle and so mark mark lynn baker you know really really stayed up with him and we did one very long scene with a long take i did on the top of this roof when he falls off of the building and you know and it's the whole front part of that scene is, you know, it's really, really long. It's, it's, it's like a farce play. And after we did that and he hadn't said much about Mark in the shooting before that.

And he came up to me and he put his hand on my shoulder and he said, I like the lad you've chosen. Well, I mean, that's the way he spoke. And I mean, that was high, high praise, high praise for Mark. And he was just at the top of his game in there. He also took out jokes. Oh, he did? Yeah, he would take them.

We, Norman, after he was cast, after we cast him, we worked on it some more, and we put more jokes in there and everything. And then when we were going to shoot the first thing we shot, which was in central park, um, he came to me, it was,

you know, uh, the sun wasn't up yet. And he said, this, there's funny stuff here, but suppose I told a real story about me. Suppose I told something real,

which maybe is about me and maybe isn't. And I said, sure. I said, and after that, if we're not crazy about that, we'll do the other stuff. He said, yes, absolutely. And so he weaved this story about where he came from and everything kind of, you know, as a little playlet or something. And afterwards, then he said, so do you want to do the jokes?

And I said, we're just fine. We'll be moving on now. But he was so sensitive to the underlying parts of that character that he didn't want to make it just silly or something. He was very wise about that. So – and in other places, he found jokes. Interesting. Because you don't think of Peter O'Toole as a comedy guy. You think of Lion and Winter and Lawrence of Arabia. a comedy guy you think no but you're lying in winter and lawrence of arabia well yeah and when

i first had to actually direct him which was that morning in the uh in the park i'm this is an amazing thing here's something amazing so the we've got about a half hour until the sun's coming up and i have a rehearsal with them with he and and Mark, and I can hear on headphones them saying the dialogue because they're far away. And it's kind of dragging and it's a little slow, and I thought, okay, this is the first shot of the movie. It's my first directing of a movie, and it's my first shot in a movie.

And it turns out, as I say to myself, okay, you are now going to direct Peter O'Toole. That's the job here. They've got to be faster and actually funnier. So I'm starting to walk up this path in Central Park where I grew up practically. And as I'm starting up there, I'm seeing, so let's see, Lawrence of Arabia, Lord Jim. Oh, yeah. The one with Katharine Hepburn. Lion and Winter. Lion and Winter.

Yeah, yeah. That's who I'm going to be talking to in a minute and telling them what to do. So I get up there and i'm doing this a little kind of dance i said you know oh it's good it's everything's good it's really good because you know when a director says that that they want something else so i said hi you know i think if we just you want it faster and funnier am i right so i So I said, you got it. I said, Oh, this is easy. Directing is easy. But then just before we're about to shoot a figure comes up over the rocks there where we are by that, by the, uh, the lake there where we were. A huge, imposing

man and a giant beard. There's nobody in the park. I mean, it's still night. And I look and I said, is that Sterling Hayden? I love that.

It's Sterling Hayden at 4.30am I'm about to start shooting this movie I said it's becoming magical in crazy ways and he comes up to me

and he said I said Mr. Hayden he said yes I said what are you doing here so he said, I said, Mr. Hayden? He said, yes. I said, what are you doing here? So he said, well, I did this movie, John Brown's Body, and I played John Brown, and I had a long dialogue scene, which I thought I was pretty good at. And they called me last night, and they want to loop it. They say there's something not quite right with the sound. They want me to redo it. And I'm taking a walk here to think if I should do that or say no, because I think it's one of the best things I've ever done.

And that's why I'm out here thinking it over. You know, this is madness in a fabulous kind of way. Had you met him before? No, no. I'm looking. Down there is the Lion in winter and lawrence of arabia up here is jack ripper from strange love and you know what i mean johnny guitar you know what i mean what the heck you know he's going who who else is in the park you know that's great that he was in there in the dark

yeah and and then he said to me is that the way put it? Is that the O'Toole down there? So I said, yes. He said, I wouldn't mind an introduction. I said, I'd be happy to. And he said, are you directing this? And I said, yes, I am. He said, well, you're doing this with a great deal of equanimity. An interesting man with an interesting life sterling yeah yeah and for those listeners who

don't know him uh just remembering the godfather sure i've searched a million of these mccluskey also was was was sought for the role of quint in jaws before yes is that right wound up not getting it for uh i don't I don't know the exact reason. Well, he had the right background for that. Sure, he was, right. And he was a whaler, you know. Right. Yeah, yeah.

By the way, that cast in my favorite year, the supporting cast, I mean, the great Joe Bologna, Selma Diamond, we love, Gilbert and I love Bill Macy. Oh, yes. Bill's great. We're not married to it. It's the whole, everything about that movie is just, is golden, Richard. Yeah.

You have a lot to be proud of. Oh, thank you. Thank you. And you, and you sought Albert Finney originally. That's, that's another funny twist. They had offered it to him and I, they said,'s up in Sausalito, and here I am. You know, I get to make a movie at MGM if he says yes. And I went up there, and he said, convince him to do it.

And there's a very short list of people, and if he doesn't do it, you know, I don't know. We don't know. And I went up there, and he lived on a houseboat. He was making a movie, Shoot the Moon. Oh, sure. Yeah, and he had done two movies before. And you know actors know actors. And I thought, he's not doing this.

He's not doing this. I can tell. We have nice lunch together. And then finally, you know, I get around to the question. I said, so will you do the movie? He said, you know, I really liked the script, but I have to go back to the stage. I've made three movies here. I only, they'll pay me a hundred pounds a week on the West End, but I've got to go back to the theater. So I said, well, you know, sorry. And then I called from the airport, and I called, I think, Mike Gruskoff,

and I said, he's not going to do it. And I called Paula, and Paula said, what about Peter? And when I got back down there uh uh i called michael back before and i said would they do it with otul and he said well he's the only other person on the list oh wow so when i landed back they he said they will if you can find him so uh that was the next deal to actually find him which we did what's weird's weird to me is like or just like it's nice to hear that Peter O'Toole is totally professional when he's working. Yeah. Because all you hear about him is like, you know, he's a wild drunk.

Well, first of all, he couldn't drink at all. He had had part of his stomach taken out before that movie, and he literally couldn't drink anything. When we got to Brooklyn, where we had this sequence when he goes to visit Lainey Kazan. Also great. Rocky Carroca. Rocky Carroca, who was a coroner, by the way, not an actor. He was a coroner in Los Angeles. And we go out to Brooklyn, and I'm getting all these people and extras and people

because they know Alan Swan is arriving. And so I'm getting them to yell out the window as the car comes, Alan Swan, we love you. Apartment 3B loves you and all that. And then I hear on the track, Arance, Arance, Arance from Arabia. And some other people who are not extras and have nothing to do with the movie see Peter O'Toole.

So the other people are yelling Alan Swan. They're yelling not Lawrence of Arabia, but Lawrence from Arabia. Lou Jacoby's great too. I mean, there's just every performance, no matter how small. Tell us about Lou Jacoby.

I always loved him. Great. You know, again, these people, I mean, they're, you know, Woody says, Alan says, there are funny people and not funny people. And that's all there is to it. There's no discussion about it. There's no talking about it. You know, any of those comedy kind of discussions of what's funny and isn't funny.

And, I mean, Gilbert, nobody knows that better than you. And he's just funny. They see things in a funny way. And it's real close to tragedy, but it's not. And Lou, just every, you know, intonation, everything comes at it from that place. And just another delightful person to be around and to work with. I mean, it was my first movie, and I kept thinking,

is it always going to be like this, you know? Well, a lot of times it was, but sometimes it wasn't. Yeah. Tonight, I predict, we'll get it on the first take. We always get it on the first take. We have to. You do? Sure. This is live television. Live.

Live. What does live mean? It means at the exact moment you're cavorting and leaping around that stage over there, 20 million people are seeing it. Wait a minute. Wait a minute! Mr. Swan, you're white. You mean it all goes into the camera lens and then just spills out into people's houses?

Yeah. Why does nobody have the goodness to explain this to me before? It's nothing to worry about, Mr. Swan. Our audiences are great. Audience? What audience? Audience. You knew there was an audience. What did you think those seats were for? I haven't performed in front of an audience for 28 years.

Audience? I played a butler. I had one line! I forgot it. Don't worry. This is going to be easy. For you, maybe. Not for me.

I'm not an actor! I'm a movie star! It's funny, too, because it's one of those things where you see O'Toole now, and as much as I love Albert Finney and admire him, I can't see anybody but Peter O'Toole now and as much as I love Albert Finney and admire him I can't see anybody but Peter O'Toole inhabits the thing he does through and through and through and Marklin Baker also great

yeah and he was the Mark was the very first person that I saw for that part Ellen Chenoweth was our casting director and everybody said as soon as they read the script i didn't know who he was and they said get mark lynn baker so he's the first person i saw and they said well cast him and i said this is my first movie i can't cast the first person i see

i have to see other people so i did i saw hundreds of other people and then i cast mark so first instinct yeah was right can we talk a little bit about westworld sure since it's since it's the remake is is out there and it's been and it's been in the news yeah i mean and i've i've read interviews with you and you said this is the only way that a guy like me is going to wind up in a Western. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. I just read Sherry Crichton, Michael's wife just sent me Michael's new book, which he started to write right after Westworld dragon teeth, which is fabulous.

And I, I just read and I was like spending time with Michael again, who he, you know, there are a few people who are the smartest people you've ever met. So it was Michael, Mike Nichols, and a few other people. And when you're in the room with them, you think you're smart too because you've got to stay up with them. And all of a sudden, you're real smart. As soon as they leave the room, you're not as smart as you were. That's interesting.

And Michael, I got that script. I got that. Sue Mengers was our agent. And Paul and I were in New York. And Sue called, and she said, honey, because it's the way she talked. The legendary Sue Mengers, wow. Yes, honey, there's this movie and I think you'll be great

and it's Michael Crichton and it's, I don't know, it's something Western, but I don't know, it's science something or other. I don't know, but you should do it. I said, well, send it to me to you should do it i said well let me send it to me uh to read it and she said i'll send it to you you can read it but i already told them that

you do it uh oh really yeah but fortunately it it was that thing of a kid from the west side of New York who's going to be riding horses, being chased by Yul Brynner, and firing a six gun. And Yul is another fabulous person. I mean, it's amazing just going through all of this. He taught me how to shoot and not blink. Oh, as you fire the gun. Yes. He said, you fire the gun. Yes. He said, I don't care.

He said, you look at big Western stars because even though there are blanks in there, there's a big sound and a big charge goes out of there. In fact, little wads of paper fly out of there. So he said, I'm going to teach you. Big Western stars, you watch any of these movies and you'll see them blink when they fire these guns, which, by the way, now is all I look for when I see any kind of Western. But he took me out behind in the back lot of MGM with a with a six gun.

And he would put one cartridge in there and spin it. And you'd pull the trigger and you'd blink because you think it's going to go off. And then I'd do it again and you'd blink. But after a little while, it's not going off. And then when one goes off, you've actually trained yourself not to blink. And I don't blink in that movie, which is one of my favorite things and greatest attributes in working in movies that you will not see me blink.

And the other thing he said, do not let them see you get on the horse. Did you lie about being able to ride a horse? Me? Yeah. No, I actually could. Okay. Cause I, but it is like that thing. Can you ride? Oh Me? Yeah. No, I actually could ride. Oh, okay.

But it is like that thing. Can you ride? Oh, yeah, sure. Yeah, I saw that interview with you. Yeah, no. I heard an interview with Edward G. Robinson, who was constantly firing guns in his movies, and they said he was scared of guns and he would blink. Yeah.

He was scared of guns, and he would blink. Yeah. He said, don't let them photograph you. Big Western stars start to get on. They put their foot in the stirrup, and then you make them cut away, and then you settle into the saddle. But you do not because those horses are big, you know, so it's like you're scrambling up and climbing and stuff, trying to. Don't let them show you doing that.

I learned a lot. Did he wear his costume from The Magnificent Seven? Did he have the same? Yeah, yeah. I don't know if it was the one, but it certainly was meant to be that. That is a truly wild motion picture. Yeah. I never forgot it.

I never forgot anything about that movie. It really made an impression on me. Yeah, no, I saw it. Thank you. I saw it not too long ago, and I actually, you know, there was a festival, a screening, and we were, Paul and I were out. I said, no, I don't want to see it. I'll wait till after because there's going to be a Q&A.

And she said, no, these people know every line in these movies you know and you'll get asked something and you won't know what they're talking about so i went in to see it and uh it holds up very well very well it's menacing i mean there's there's a real sense of terror scary it is scary yeah and we of course have to have a buster keaton story well the buster Keaton story for me is a sad story because I was so young that I didn't know the whole thing. Do you know? I didn't know. Paula made this. Her first movie was Where the Boys Are, and George Wells wrote the script, and he had a boat out in the marina.

the script and he had a boat out in the marina and he asked paula and uh if he she'd like to come out to the boat and she said yes and i'd like to bring my well were we married i don't think we were married and my boyfriend with oh yeah sure and buster keaton was on the boat we were chatting with him and i half knew if i only knew then what I know now, you know, that this genius, that's who I was talking to. But there have been a lot of things like that. If I had only known everything, we met Ginger Rogers when we were real young. And then later I see all of this stuff, you know, with the stare and everything. And it's like you don't know. You're too young and you're all involved with yourself and everything.

But, boy, I would have loved to have asked him so many things. I did meet Stan Laurel. Yeah, I was just going to ask you about that. I did meet Stan Laurel. I think I have this story right that Jerry Lewis put he and his wife, Laurel and his wife up in an apartment on uh oh the one in Santa Monica that's right yeah that's right god you're you're a vast no I spent a lot of time reading about this stuff Richard uh uh and um we also had Chuck McCann

on the show who would go to that apartment oh so yeah and i think it was jerry lewis who saw them to that um and it's interesting because my uncle joe browning that we talked about a while ago in the beacon hotel over the beacon theater that's where he and my aunt francis lived and in the middle of that small they had a one bedroom know, kind of suite, was a trunk. And it had JB with the letters intertwined, and it was like, have trunk, will travel. Those people were ready to go. You know, they were just waiting for the phone call. And when my friend Jerry Ziesmer was doing a treatise, I think, at UCLA on Laurel and Hardy, and he said, I'm going out to interview Stan Laurel.

Do you want to come? I said, oh, yeah. So we went out, and there's a buzzer down, you know, how you buzz in. And he hit the buzzer, and then you heard, hello, you know, come right up you know and i said my god it's stan floor and in the middle of that little apartment was that same kind of trunk with sl you know intertwined i mean it was like he's ready to go he's ready to go out there. That's great. Yeah. They said he was like an easy person to get. He was in the phone book. Oh, really?

Stan Laurel. Yeah, I think that's how Chuck McCann got to him. I think he picked up the phone when he was a kid and called him. Yeah. When he was a young man. Yeah, you see. Go ahead, sorry. No, I was also, I heard Jerry Lewis wanted Stan Laurel to be his advisor when he made movies.

Oh, yeah, that makes sense. Yeah, that makes sense. Yeah. I just want to ask, too, about the Sunshine Boys and just to bring it back a little bit to your uncle. First of all, I did a little research on your uncle, on Joe Browning. Did he have a partner named Al Levan? Did he work with another guy?

I don't know that. I saw him at the palace when I was five years old in New York. My parents came. I was in my little pajamas and robe and stuff and they said, get dressed. We're going to see Uncle Joe. I don't know what the

heck they were talking about. And they took me down behind the screen. There was a movie on before the show. I had no idea what any of this was. And you can see through the screen because it's porous. So I saw all these people looking up. I don't know what the movie was, but they're all looking up in this direction.

They're all looking at me, you know, and, but they can't see me. And then they get me around and take me to a seat. And he comes out with a minister's collar, his two front teeth blacked out, and a round hat, and he was solo, so he had no partner then.

I don't know if he ever did. Well, I'll send you the research I found. It's interesting. Oh, I'd love to see it. Yeah. Yeah, I'd love to see it. Well, what was the act? What did he do?

He did. It's hard. What I heard, what George Burns told me and what I heard on the record, that I remember. I think he did something very similar. He sang and he told jokes about marriage. They were marriage jokes or something. But I had no concept what this was because it's Uncle Joe, but for some reason his teeth are blacked out or he doesn't have any, as far as I knew,

he didn't have teeth at that time and he's talking and these people are laughing. And what, what is this? What's what's, are these his friends or what? Um, but yeah,

you're like Groucho. You had an uncle in vaudeville yeah yeah and a hard scrabble life i mean we had i don't know if you've read cliff nesteroff's book the comedians which is a a great read about uh we recommend it to you but there's a there's a whole section in the book about vaudeville about vaudevillians and what they went through the marks brothers i mean not an easy life at all oh no no no i mean traveling all over and eight shows uh well four shows a day or something like that you know and unscrupulous managers and people stealing their money and yeah no you know no theatrical unions to protect them yeah yeah like they. Like they said, they had like rat-infested dressing rooms.

Yeah, yeah. Well, and also, and I think he was on The Sullivan Show, my uncle, I think. But here are these people playing the Keith Circuit or wherever, doing the same act for 20 years, 30 years and everything.

One shot on The Sullivan Show and that's it. It's over. What else you got, you know? So when The Sunshine Boys was presented to you, you had a soft spot for this kind of story? Is it Smith and Dale that the boys are supposedly based on? Because I hear different things. I know Gallagher and Sheen didn't like each other either.

No, no, it's Smith and Dale. And Joe Smith, I came to one of our sets in New Jersey. He was staying at a home up there in New Jersey near Englewood or something. And he came there one day. Yeah, no, it's Smith and dale because that whole sketch is so much like the cronkite sketch and stuff uh yeah that must have been a fun movie to make just to be i know you said math has spent a lot of time in his trailer but just be when when george and i went to lunch he stayed he never went out yeah and he played classical music there and he stayed there during lunch

but just to be with those two guys oh man it was the best it was really the best yeah you put down the variety and listen to me I left three clients sitting in my office so I could come over here that makes four of us not awake

how's the children? since when are you interested in my children? You haven't seen them in a year. You don't even remember their names. Millie and Sidney. Amanda and Michael. What's the matter? You didn't like Millie and Sidney? You forgot, so you made something up.

You forget everything, like buying fresh food. Listen, ABC, call... Do they know who I am? What a great star I was. Who? Amanda and, uh, Chipkiff. Amanda and Michael. They're three years old, Uncle Willie.

They don't remember Vaudeville. Abe. Why is it I only get aggravated when I come over here to see you? If you want, I'll meet you someplace else. Is that supposed to be funny? I don't think that's funny, Uncle Willie. If you had a sense of humor, you'd think it was funny. I have a terrific sense of humor.

Like your father, he laughed once in 1932. We're winding down, Richard, but we've got to ask you a little bit about Catch-22. Yeah. And you're talking about meeting larger-than-life figures. What about Orson Welles? Well, so Welleses here's a story so we were told not to talk to him no one is to talk to him and don't look right at him don't catch his eye and don't look at him really yeah uh you're all young actors at this point i

mean it's you and balaban and arkin balaban and arkin and john voight and martin sheen marty sheen peter bonner all babies groden yeah uh what a cast yeah everybody so yeah All on, yeah, everybody. So, yeah, don't talk to him. So, really? Okay. So he never, he had this, he played General Dreidel. He had this uniform made for him because he was of some size. And he never, we only saw him in that uniform. We never saw him any other way.

So they bring him to the set. The set was in the middle of the desert near a runway that they built in Wymas. And they put him in a chair and put an umbrella over him. And we're about 20 or 30 feet away. And we're sitting under umbrellas and there he is, you know, but we're not allowed to talk to him. Okay. After that lunch of that day,

the assistant director comes over to us and says, Mr. Wells is, is very upset. And I said, why? We said, well, nobody will talk to him. I said, what are you talking about?

We were told never to talk to him, not even look at him. Who told you that? I don't know, some assistant or somebody. And everybody said, yeah, we were all told that. Well, we don't know where that came from. yeah, we were all told that. Well, we don't know where that came from. So right away, we all picked up our chairs and motored over right and surrounded him.

And then it just took off. I mean, these stories were unbelievable and amazing kinds of stories. And then he told a story, a long story, about Leland Hayward, the producer. An amazing, convoluted, complex story, which probably had some sexual parts of it or something. And it was funny and outrageous. And he finished the story. funny and outrageous. And he finished the story. What he didn't know is about a foot and a half away was Brooke Hayward, Leland Hayward's daughter, who was going with Buck Henry at the time,

was there. And she said, oh, Mr. Wells, I'm Brooke Hayward, Leland Hayward's daughter. Mr. Wells, I'm Brooke Hayward, Leland Hayward's daughter, and I think that story is not true at all. And he said, you know, you may be right. How is it? I heard he was acting out a little bit, that he was giving other actors line readings and things like that. He was doing things, and Mike was very respectful and all of that.

Mike said before he came, he said, now, I may be a little different for a few days while he's here, but then I'll be back to who I really am once he's gone. But he would do things like, but Mike was respectful and humored him, and he would say things like, well, if that's the lens you're going to use and I'm in the foreground like this and you're over here, won't I be out of focus? No, no, no. So there was a little of that going on.

But Peter Bogdanovich was there interviewing him for a book or something, and we used to see them. These are all, you know, in Catch-22, there are these crazy kind of visions. Well, it became the being there was like these crazy visions. And so off in the distance, we'd see Peter Vyodanovich under a parasol, way in the distance, interviewing a man in a general's uniform. And then he was gone.

So then his part finished. And then they found out they needed to make a shot. You wouldn't see his face or anything, but they needed to make a shot. So Mike said, go get the uniform and get me a double because I got to just do this. You won't see him. Don't worry about it. And the costume coordinator said, well, we don't have the uniform.

And there was no double. He said, what do you mean you don't have the uniform? So Mr. Wells't have the uniform so mr wells left with the uniform how bizarre yeah and you were also and this was i think it's funny it's around the time of the graduate that these type movies were coming out you were in goodbye columbus oh a favorite a favorite oh thanks yeah no movies were changing you know movies uh they were getting to be about real people in real situations and they had you know uh something to say uh about society and stuff, yeah. That was fortunate for me because, you know, before that, movies had, you know, Cary Grant and Clark Gable and, you know, people like that.

Well, the right person at the right time. Yeah. So much timing in the business. Yeah. What can you tell us about either Klugman or Jack Guilford? Oh, yeah. Either Jack. Both of them again you know jack gilford lived in our he lived on the upper west side he lived near us um uh also great uh what was that

was it a popcorn commercial what was that oh the cracker jack yes crack yes everybody remembers him for that. Yeah, so great. And, yeah, he and his wife were down there in Wymas. And Klugman, yeah, you know, again, so you see 12 angry men filled with these fabulous people, Klugman and Jack Warden and, you know, these great people. And then you're doing scenes with these people. So it's a dream. All of it's kind of a dream. But a delightful person.

And, again, all professional, hardworking, but easy. All good people. And I knew when I saw Ali for the first time, I said, this girl's who we saw. Ali McGraw. Ali McGraw. Yeah. You can just tell.

Because I believe that it's who you are. I mean, I've tried to cast for who the person is, what's inside, what's their soul. I think that's what the camera reads. I think it sees who anybody is. It's like a laser. It goes right through them. And with her, she's such a genuine soul, Allie, that it just comes through, I think. What did you mean?

I found a quote, Richard, if I can ask you. You believe in making films for the right reasons. Well, yeah. I mean, Phil Gersh was our agent and Phil used to, was Bogart's agent for one. And he always said, just try and do good things and see what happens after that. It's tough because sometimes you've got to pay the rent. It's hard to hold on to that in this business of doing something because you believe in it. But I have found that if I've done something for the wrong reason,

it comes back to bite you. And it's harder when you need to have the wind at your back. You need to sail along and being pushed by what you're committed to and what you believe, especially if you're directing, because that's all there is. And if you're doing it for the wrong reasons, you know it, and every decision, every camera angle, everything about it is false because it's not for the right reason.

And sometimes, I mean, sometimes you're wrong and you turn something down that, you know, turns out, but it's probably something you couldn't have done because you don't believe in it. It's too hard. I mean, making movies is hard and everything conspires against you in every single way

and you've got to, you know, cut through all of that and keep these blinders on because you think you know what this vision is and nothing can dissuade you from it. But if you're doing it for the wrong reason, for the money or whatever, you know, you, you're open then you're open to, you know, wherever it could go because you don't believe in it. Um, so that's what I think I mean by that. And do you have a preference between acting and directing? What are you doing more of now, by the way? Well, I would like, I'm not doing enough right now to tell you the truth. Um, I, uh, I mean, I've acted more recently but uh i would

like i have a movie that i keep trying to get made but you know we all know that story uh yeah i like i love directing i always did from the very beginning it's what i did at school and stuff but how do you get to do it uh you know it's can walk in and meet Larry Pierce and Stanley Jaffe, the director and producer of Goodbye Columbus, and somehow convince them that they got to cast me in this movie. Or I can go read for a play and get the job or don't get the job. And what have I got? I've got, you know, just pair of shoes walking in there and the script in my hand, but directing who's going to let you do that? Uh, you know, who's going to give you 15 or $20 million, uh, to make

a movie and with a cast and crew of a hundred people, you know, so how to get to do that, um, is really, really hard, but, uh, it is what I always wanted, wanted to do. And I did it at school. And, uh, but when I came out of school, I, you know, I, I started to get work as an actor. I mean, it took a while, but I, I, I did. And our agent, Phil Gershh who was basically a director's agent asked me so what do you I know you want to do that what are you doing about that so he helped me get started in that he and his son uh David and he handled Robert Wise and people like that didn't yes he did I also find it interesting that you not only went to to directors for advice but that you you you said that you learned something from a lot of these directors you learned a little bit from Pierce and a little bit from Herbert Ross and a little

bit from Mike Nichols and you and from yeah and Clint and Clint Eastwood yeah tell us that for well that's pretty great I meanint uh clint on the set is the crew loves him because the minute you say cut or something he's picking up cable and stuff and he's moving stuff and you know he's right he's right in there and he what i learned there is What I learned there is don't sweat it. Don't try to get for perfection at the expense of the good. Don't stay in the same setup. You know what happens. You get into a setup and you get comfortable in it

and everything is set that way and you make the actors do it over and over again and you get comfortable in it and everything is set that way and you make the actors do it over and over again and you get little nuances, you get little differences and stuff like that. But mostly, I mean, I've even shot rehearsals and the best stuff usually is right there at the beginning. But sometimes you have to do more. But he said,

you're going to thank yourself later instead of staying there and doing all these takes in the same angle if you change it and get different angles. Because in cutting, that's where you're going to need the help. And instead of finding, well, that takes a little bit better than that take. And also to move fast he makes movies fast and the crew loves it the actors love it because of the energy of it you don't get bogged down and so i learned a lot from him uh we and i we we there was a I did one scene and there was a huge scratch giant scratch on the negative uh I mean now you know you could get rid of it but um and I said we have to reshoot that and he said why I said well look at that I mean we can't have that he said you know uh this gets run through a projector two or three times what What do you think this is going to look like?

You're going to have more scratches and stuff like that. He doesn't sweat any of that stuff. And he considers it all kind of an impressionistic thing. It's like a mosaic, you know, and it comes together in a way that surprises you instead of sweating all this stuff and trying to get perfection out of it. So I learned a lot from him.

And I heard Burt Reynolds was injured in the oil. Yeah, he was. He fell in his trailer or something and hurt his jaw. He fell in his trailer or something and hurt his jaw. And that, you know, we were really sailing along there pretty good. The first scene in that movie, it hadn't happened yet. And there's this fight scene, and it was a lot of fun and stuff and everything. But afterwards, it affected him. I mean, he got hurt.

I mean, he worked through it. But, you know, he had that, I forget what you call it, but it is a jaw thing that affects you. TMJ? Yeah, I think so. I think so. And I had heard a story that they hit him with a chair that was supposed to be a collapsible chair, and they hit him with an actual chair no i love the i love these stories yeah maybe that wasn't richard's movie that that maybe it wasn't something else yeah no it was in his trailer he slipped or something in his trailer uh uh no nobody hit him with a chair that i know of yeah because i mean for years after that movie, people were saying, oh,

Burt Reynolds is dying. He's got some mystery illness. A fun movie, City Heat. You know, it's fun to watch those two guys, those two big action stars on the screen together. Yeah, and they had known each other a long time and stuff. So, yeah, that was another one, you know, of saying, look at this. Look what I'm doing. Right. How'd this happen? I want to recommend to our, on the subject of the movies you've directed, too, we've got about a million people a month listening to this show now, Richard.

Oh, great. Which is a pleasant surprise to us because we started as a labor of love at Gilbert's Kitchen Table. Oh, that's great. Three years ago, and now we're talking to Carl Reiner, and we just talked to Norman Lear and you. Oh, that's great. We had one guest whose name we won't mention, but he was already a little too old to be doing it at that point.

We don't talk about that one because we didn't use it. And I remember after we interviewed him, Frank and I were sitting in a pizza place together, and I said, all right, we tried to do a podcast. You know, we wanted to tell the history of show business, things that meant a lot to us, to talk about people like Elsa Lanchester and to keep the memory of these people alive. That's nice. and we've done 170 something of them now is that right it's a yeah we've had roger corman here we had bruce here uh we made a picture with uh julie corman oh saturday the 14th saturday the 14th yeah you

got some stories about that one i'll bet we'll we'll wrap it up, but our fans are going to get on our case if we don't ask you one thing about Quark. Oh, Quark, yes. With the great Buck Henry. The great Buck Henry is right. Quark, you know, there are a few people, and it doesn't matter about the money or anything, but if they're doing something and

it's like Mike Nichols, Elaine May, Woody Allen, Buck Henry, Neil Simon, there's a group. You got to get in there. Mel Brooks, Carl Reiner, you got to say, anything for me in this area? And Buck is that that buck is that uh so i heard about that and i called and they said well whatever they wherever they thought you know i was in the firmament of things that we don't think we can afford you i said let's not concern ourselves about that uh you know i i read the thing and i thought it was hilarious um so uh we actually uh you know, made that pilot, and they picked it up. But we got fan mail from physicists, from actual physicists. Well, that thing about the black hole, you know, that's pretty close to what it should be,

even though we were collecting garbage in space. I'm going just just tell our listeners if we weren't familiar with it it was a sci-fi a spoof about a garbage scowl yeah yeah he was a garbage collector but you spoofed very intelligent sci-fi stuff yeah but that's it like kubrick yes exactly and they said people said what is this you know should this be on saturday morning or what is it? And, of course, there were only eight of them. And by that time, it was too late and NBC took it off.

But, I mean, you've got to place characters. One character, Conrad Janis, is Otto Palindrome. Yeah, he was fun. Well, Otto, O-T-O, is a palindrome. Otto Bob Palindrome. His middle name was a palindrome, too. Oh, is that right? Yeah.

And then he had another character, The Head, who was only a head. Right. And the two girls. Oh, Tim Thomerson. And Tim Thomerson, Gene Gene. Gene Gene. J-E-A-N and G-E-N. Oh, Tim Thomerson. And Tim Thomerson. Gene, Gene. Gene, Gene. J-E-A-N. A funny guy.

Yeah, really funny. Who would all of a sudden become a complete woman for a second and worry about his nails when we're supposed to be attacking aliens or something. And the two girls, the Barnstable girls. Right. One of them's real. The other one's a clone. And my character, A. Quark, is in love with one of them, but he doesn't know which one it is.

And it's the kind of stuff that you just love. It's a shame. Sometimes the guests come on and they talk about these shows. Norman, too. We were talking with Norman Lear about Hot El Baltimore and some of his other things. It's a different era. You talk about timing. There were only three networks.

You had three shots at getting something like Quark, getting a life for it. Today, a show that intelligent and that offbeat. Yeah. You've got Amazon. You've got Netflix. It might have a life today. That's right. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. How's Buck doing? You talk to him? Yes. Oh, we see him all the time. He's doing very well. We want to get him on here. Oh, we see him all the time. He's doing very well. We want to get him on here.

Oh, that'd be great. Put a word in for us, would you? Oh, I will. I will. Yeah. He's just great. We saw him the other night. Yeah.

When I send you the links about your uncle, I found an article in the New York Times. A friend of mine, Frank DiCaro, wrote a passionate article, an essay about Quark. Oh, really? About how wonderful Quark was. Yes, it's in the Times. Well, you know, there was a thing, maybe, who did the DVD thing? Was it David Kerr? I can't remember.

Anyway, about three years ago, two, three years ago, he said this is what DVDs were made for. And he was talking about Quark. Yeah, shows like that. Or Mel's show when things were rotten. Yeah, yeah. You know, short live shows with great casts that didn't get the life they deserved. Yeah, yeah. And that other show that was Jerry Zuckererry zucker's show remember oh police squad

oh god we're gonna get we're gonna get try to get jerry or david on here to talk about that yeah that'd be good really good really good stuff yeah so gil anything else you want to ask this man before we let him get on with his life this is really important for me what that? And it's the only reason I agreed to do this interview. What is that? Goodbye Columbus the theme song was sung by the association. You remember that Richard? I do.

Hello life goodbye Columbus. Yes. Got to say hello it's a lucky day. Kiss the moon goodbye and we're on our way. It's a lucky day because I found you. Going to build a new world around you. Touch the sun and run.

It's a lucky day. Hello, life. Goodbye, Columbus. I got a feeling that you're going to hear from us. You're going to know that we're taking the world by surprise. Got that look in your eyes. It's a lucky day. Just for changing, leaving the world behind.

Now you're torturing the man. Lucky day walking a new road to clear your mind. It's a day for starting a new way. Tell everyone goodbye. It's a lucky day. Oh, hello world. Goodbye, California. Has anyone ever sung that to you in your career?

Beg pardon? Has anyone ever sung that to you in your career, in all the interviews you've done? You know, let me think. I think it's the first time. Yeah. I'm just trying to remember. But I believe it is the first time. I wonder if it'll be the last time.

It might be. There was an episode of Quark called Goodbye Polumbus. Which I found in my research. Richard Benjamin homage. Richard, there's so much we could do here. I really enjoy it, Frank. And Gilbert,

I just think you're hysterical, by the way. I thought I should let you know that. Oh, thank you. Now, why didn't... You're really... Oh, go ahead. Huh? Why didn't I cast you?

You know I'm going to be thinking about this for a long time. You're going to give the guy the gilts. Oh. Yeah. No, but what else were you going to say? You're going to say, Gilbert, you're fantastic, and I interrupt you. And things like that. I really have always thought you're just great, really, really funny.

Oh, thank you. That's nice. See, the show has turned into an admiration society. Yes, yes. Norman Lear was saying that to him the other night, and he was sky high, Richard. Yeah. Well, it's true. It's really true.

And your thing of the aristocrats. Oh, yes. Brilliant. Completely brilliant. Oh, thank you. Yeah. And I had a nice talk with your wife and she seems very lovely. She is. She's the reason this whole thing came to be. Of course, you don't have to live with her. Oh.

I'm sure she's going to be very happy with that remote. I've done some things on television talking about Paula, and later people said, I don't think you can go home tonight. You guys were great just to bring up Paula too. You too uh you guys and he and she another show if i may say that i think would have a life today yeah well you know it we followed green acres the first was beverly hillbillies and green acres and as we would our show would come on and at the end of green acres there was was a little pig named Arnold who danced. Oh, yes, Arnold Ziffel.

Yeah, and I said to Paula, you know, I think these two shows that are so highly rated, I don't know if all those people who love this dancing pig are going to be coming over to us. And, you know, our ratings just were not up to those those those two shows uh but it that that that um city cosmopolitan thing quite you know hadn't happened quite happened yet we we were sort of yeah you were you were a little early like he like gilbert was saying with goodbye columbus kind of being owing something to the graduate yeah Yeah. I mean, true of that show, too. Yeah.

Because of Mary, she was a working woman. That's right. Paula's character. Yeah. And we slept in the same bed. That, too. Yeah. If you look at the Dick Van Dyke show, they're not in the same bed.

Correct. You know, I'm not positive, but I think the first couple to sleep in the same bed on television were the monsters that may be so because i think they probably thought well two monsters we we can't envision them having sex and chris hayward who created the monsters was one of the writers on He and She. Wow. There's a little symmetry for you. Yes, yes. But we were before the Munsters.

Oh, you were. Oh. What was he? And we were real people. Well, the Munsters, I think, was 64, 65? Oh, is that right? Then it was first. Then it was before us. I could be totally wrong. No, you may be right because I think it was in black and white, right? Oh, is that right? Then it was first. Then it was before us. I could be totally wrong.

No, you may be right because I think it was in black and white, right? Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. So, yeah. And our show was color, yeah. Jack Cassidy and Kenneth Mars. Jack.

Two other. And Hamilton Camp. And the late Hamilton Camp. Yeah, yeah. Two great. We had a great time. Yeah. Great time.

So much to cover. So much to cover. It's been a run. Yeah. This, too great. We had a great time. Yeah, great time. So much to cover. So much to cover. It's been a run. Yeah, this is so nice. It's like you said before about this is your life. Yeah. Without bringing in the school teachers and the awkward. Yes.

And the great show of shows when Sid Caesar did that, This is Your Life. Oh, yes. Oh, with Howard Morris. Uncle Goopy. Yeah, we talked to Carl about that. And he said it wasn't supposed to go on like nine and a half minutes. It was supposed to be a short bit.

And Sid Caesar started doing this fight, fighting people. Well, first he made them chase him through the house. So brilliant. Yeah. Brilliant. Anything coming up, Richard, that you want to plug or you want to throw out there? No, I don't know.

I would like something to come up, but I can't say exactly. Please give our best to your wife, who we're fans of. Oh, I will. And the last thing I'll say is look for a Simpsons episode called Itchy and Scratchy Land, if you don't know it. Because it's a very funny, sophisticated parody of Westworld, of the original Westworld. Is that right? Yeah.

Has it been on yet? It's been on many times, yeah. Oh, okay. Yeah, it aired years ago, but it's a classic episode, and it's very specifically an homage to the original Westworld. And is there a way to find it? I'll send it to you. Oh, would you? Sure.

Oh, that would be great. And I'm going to send you some stuff about your uncle. Oh, great. Thank you. I appreciate it. This was a lot of fun for us. Oh, and for me. And as our engineer told us before we were on the air,

And as our engineer told us before we were on the air, he said he wants to put together a montage of all the times that Frank and I have said to a guest, well, we barely scratched the surface. But it's true. I mean, we didn't get to Frank Perry. I wanted to ask you about Herbert Ross, but another time. Yeah, that would be great. This was a treat. Thank you so much, Richard. And for me, too.

Thank you, Frank. Thank you. This has been Gilbert Gottfried's Amazing Colossal Podcast with my co-host, Frank Santopadre. And we've been talking to a man who wouldn't hire me. But he seems to have no memory of it. But my stepfather was an alien. But the great Richard Benjamin.

Thank you, Richard. Thank you both. Thank you so much. Thank you. I really appreciate it. Thank you.