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IFH 690: Inside the Golden Age of Hollywood with George Stevens Jr. · Indie Film Hustle® - A Filmmaking Podcast

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You are listening to the IFH podcast Network. For more amazing filmmaking and screenwriting
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podcasts, just go to IFAH podcast network dot com. Welcome to the Indie
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Film Hustle Podcast, Episode number six ninety. Film is a Battleground. Sam
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Fuller broadcasting from the back alley in Hollywood. It's the Indie Film Hustle Podcast,
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where we show you how to survive and thrive as an indie filmmaker in
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the jungles of the film biz. And here's your host, Alex Ferrari.
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Welcome, Welcome to another episode of the Indie Film Hustle Podcast. I am
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your humble host, Alex Ferrari. Today's show is sponsored by Rise of the
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Now, guys, today on the show, we have Oscar winning legendary
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filmmaker and producer George Stephens Junior. Now George is an American writer, playwright,
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director and producer. He is the founder of the American Film Institute and
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the creator of the AFI Lifetime Achievement Award. He is also the co creator
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of the Kennedy Center Honors. George and I had a very deep conversation about
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his legacy, his father's work, his legendary father, George Stevens's directorial work.
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What he hopes the industry will become and what it was like living in
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the golden age of Hollywood. So, without any further ado, please enjoy
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my conversation with George Stevens Junior. I'd like to welcome to the show,
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George Stevens Jr. How are you doing, George, I'm doing well.
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Thank you, Thank you so much for coming on the show, Sir.
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I'm excited to talk to You've lived a very interesting life, sir, to
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say the least, well, I'm working on it. You have definitely gone
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through some journeys in your life, in the film industry, in politics,
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in so many different areas. So my first my first question to you is
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how did you get started in the film industry? And I know your father
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was a little well known director, the little guy started out a few years
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ago. But how did you get your interests? How did you get your
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foot in the door if you will, Well, as you suggest, my
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father was a director, but he had just for full disclosure, my great
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grandmother was born in San Francisco after the Civil War and became an actress and
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a fine actress on the stage, and she was known as the youngest Ophelia
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to the great Edwin Booth's Hamlet. He was the greatest Shakespearean actor really,
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I think in American history. Certainly his Hamlet is renowned. And she started
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five generations of Stevens's in show business. Her daughter, Georgie Cooper, was
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my father's mother, and she married an actor called Lander's Stevens and it kind
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of went on from there. And yes, having been born to a father
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who was a director. At the time I was born, he was photographing
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Laurel and Hardy comedies, was a cameraman. In nineteen thirty five he directed
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Alice Adams with Katherine Hepburn and Fred McMurray at age thirty and from then on
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he just made the great films, one after the other. Had a three
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year experience in World War Two overseas in that chronology, and when he came
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back from the war, I was a couple of years after that. I
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was graduating from high school and I didn't have a summer job, and he
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said, well, you can help me, and he gave me two jobs.
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One did this at a home and was to break down Theodore Dreiser's An
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American Tragedy, the great novel of a of a murder in the Eastern United
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States because he was about to write the screenplay for what became called A Place
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in the Sun with Montgomery Cliff and Elizabeth Taylor and Shelley Winters, which was
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his first Oscar winning picture as a director. And I broke that down and
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gave him all the information and two notebooks. And then also I was to
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read the stories they sent from Paramount Pictures, where his company was. They'd
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sent books, screenplays, all sorts of stuff, and it was pretty yeah,
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becames it was kind of boring because most of these were kind of triakly
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love novels, you know, for a seventeen year old, hot summer afternoons.
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Yeah, But one afternoon a little smaller book came and I picked it
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up and I read it in the afternoon, and I want to see him
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that night with the book in my hand, and I walked in. He
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was in bed reading and I said, Dad, I said, this is
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really a good story. I think you ought to read it. And he
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said, why don't you tell me the story? So I started my brain
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started working and I started reconstructing this book that I'd read, and I walked
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around his bed telling him the story of Shane it was Jack Shaker's novel,
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and you know, I could get more interested in that a little boy with
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this gun slinger he had. And then the next summer I was in Jackson
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Hole, Wyoming with my first job on a movie set. I was what
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was called company clerk, which I'm meant I kept track of stuff. I
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was right near the camera, and I did not know it was going to
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be a classic film. Shane is celebrating its seventieth anniversary this year, And
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so it was seventy one years ago that I was in Jackson Hole and watching
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Alan Ladd and Van Heflin and Jean Arthur and this little boy from New York
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who'd never been west of New Jersey and he and Jack Palance who came was
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his first major role. And so I was there, I was seeing it
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all, and I did kind of fall in love with it. You got
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so, I mean, you were born into the business. I know a
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lot of people who've been born in the business that don't get bitten by the
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bug. But it seems like you were not only bitten. You were not
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You were mauled by the book. And some people get bitten badly by it
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all the way, you know, that particularly. I mean, I'm very
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fortunate that I had a wonderful father and mother, but sons of famous fathers
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there you know at the time that most of them were having difficulty with it,
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And I think largely by the nature of my father, Um, it
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worked out beautifully for him and for me. We became partners and did things
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together later. Now, you you also worked on You worked on as a
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PA on a bunch of your father's movies. One specifically, was a little
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film called Giant. Um, what was it like being on set watching Elizabeth
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Taylor and James Dean And what's the biggest lesson you pulled from being on the
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set of such a classic film like that? Gosh, there there's so many
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alex Um. But it was a great experience because I gotten out of the
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Air Force, I got out of college Buck Occidental College, and the Korean
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War ended and they postponed my commission for a year and I had nothing to
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do. And at that very moment, or a couple of months before,
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Dad had acquired the novel Giant and made a deal with Warner Brothers to make
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it. So I spent nine months with him and two writers in his living
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room working on the scriptive Giant, I obviously as a junior partner observer for
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the most part, but you started to learn about film structure. And then
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one night then I went in the Air Force, and when he started shooting
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just before I was in Los Angeles and he said, to show you a
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movie. So my mother and dad and I went to Musso Franks on Hollywood
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Boulevard, and then across the street in the Egyptian Theater and saw Elia Kazan's
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East of Eden. We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor,
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and now back to the show. Oh, and the reason he wanted me
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to see it was that this young actor, never seen before comes on the
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screen and had this way of kind of walking and his uphooted eyes. And
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it was James Steen, and Dad was considering casting him in the role of
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jet Reek, who in the book was described at this sort of burly big
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fellow. But Jimmy Dean was his shooting rebel without a cause at Warner Brothers,
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and he kept hanging around Dad's office because he knew about Giant and he
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wanted to be a Giant. And though he was very different than Jet Reek
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had been imagined, Dad thought he was a kind of a once in a
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lifetime talent and gave him that role. And when you think about it,
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the three stars, Rock Hudson was twenty eight. These actors all went on
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to play in their fifties, you know, with gray hair. Elizabeth was
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twenty three and Jimmy Dean was twenty three, and for what it was worth,
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I was twenty three, and you know, but to watch this work
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go on. Being in the Air Force, I flew to Virginia to see
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the film. Shot in Virginia where the film begins where Elizabeth Taylor is the
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daughter of this man with a great stallion war Winds, and Rock Hutson dumps
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from Texas to buy war winds and they fall in love very quickly, etc.
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Etc. So I was there, and then I would fly into Marfa,
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Texas, and then I would be on the set and and there were
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lots of experiences. I've a sad experience. I was on the set very
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late in the picture. Jimmy Dean had finished all of his shooting, and
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he had he had agreed not to dry. He had a little race car
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and he'd agreed not to drive it while the film was going on because if
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he broke his leg, everybody would be out of work. He understood that,
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but he'd finished shooting. So he bought a sport a Porsche Spider,
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I think a poor Spider five hundred it was called. And I was on
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the set one day and Jimmy walked in with his kind of tinted glasses and
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told me about the car, and he said, you want to ride?
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So I walked outside the big sound stage at Warner Brothers with all those you
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know, narrow roads you've seen pictures if you haven't been there, and this
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little gray roadster sitting on the ground seemed so tiny, and we got into
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it and he reved it up, and we drove through the studio lots of
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thank god, a prop truck wasn't coming or a studio policeman, and came
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back mark and he said what do you think? And I said, well,
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it's pretty good. It's pretty good now. Of course, the sad
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part of the story is that two weeks later Jimmy he had told my father
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he was going to ship the car up to Selenas from Los Angeles, where
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he was going to be racing, and but on the morning of the day
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he decided not to ship it, and he and his mechanic got in the
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car and Jimmy drove it up and they had that accident on the Pacific Coast
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Highway. And Jimmy was really a He was a complicated guy, but he
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was talented and fun and I think he had plans to become a director,
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and uh, you know, but it was such a tragic loss. And
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it is strange how you know, this is sixty five years ago, Giant,
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how his memory lives today? Oh, without question, he's I mean
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I've been, I've been at the Observatory, I've seen the block there in
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the statue at James Dean. Yeah, I mean he's I mean rebel with
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those those movies, A giant rebel and East of Eden, I mean,
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they just it is one of the tragic stories of of of Hollywood history,
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without question. What could have What else could have been? What else could
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he have done? If given the opportunity? It was, it was,
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it was pretty brilliant. It was by then twenty four had a whole life
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ahead of him. You asked about a lesson on Giant might be interested.
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Years filmmaker listeners Um were editing the film. I was now out of the
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Air Force. Yeah, and three hour and twenty minute film Giant. Yeah.
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We we premiered it at the Turner Classic Movies Festival last year. Steven
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Spielberg and I introduced a restoration of it and that film plays. To see
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it with an audience those years later, and they're just with it every minute
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on the big giant Imax screen. You know. It's a film about an
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independent women woman. They weren't making films about independent women in nineteen fifty six.
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And it's a film about the Hispanic problem or that existed back then,
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and it's an issue we are still working with in our country. So the
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film is so far ahead of its time, and it's and it's kind of
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values and concerns. But we were editing and we've been I've been working with
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him for a year in the editing room again, hot summer, you know,
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and I've got a golf game to worry about. And we've had two
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previews. And I said to him, just the two of us there,
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and you know, we're running the picture. And I said, Dad,
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I said, this picture. We've had two previews. Audiences love it,
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I think, just don't you want to get it out there? And he
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looked at me and he said, when you think how many man hours I
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think and they said, man and woman hours are going to be spent over
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the years watching this picture. People sitting and watching it. How much time
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will be spent. Don't just think it's worth a little more of our time
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right now to make it as good as we can. And it's a lesson
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that I took with me and everything that I've done in that idea, that
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and that. It's just I just finished a book, as we called My
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Place in the Sun, life in the Golden Age of Hollywood and Washington,
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and I was finishing it during COVID, which gave me time, and I
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worked on it. Like Giant, I just would go back to you quote
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real one as why he would do chapter one and go through it and just
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polish it and make it as good for the audience as you can. The
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lesson is respect for the audience, and I think that should be in the
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head of every filmmaker, absolutely without question. Now you were when you were
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on the set of Giant, you had a young Elizabeth Taylor, which was
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your age at the time. Um, she's obviously a legend, and what
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she was able to do I've got to imagine guy to guy, you must
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have had a crush on her. I mean, every man on that set
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probably had a crush on her. But she met her age. I met
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her a few years before when Dad was took place in the sun and I
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came on the set and a Saturday, and Montgomery Clift and Elizabeth Taylor were
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shooting a scene. And I watched Dad direct the scene. And a quick
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story is, you have people who make films, and he said, Monty,
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why don't you to go over there by the pool table and Elizabeth,
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why don't you just start at the door and then we just try to And
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so they went and they did the scene with a clip clip slipt script girl
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pip person giving her, you know, corrections if they missed the dialogue,
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you know, And Dad said, all right, he said, let's do
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it one more time, and suddenly went back and they did it again.
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Yeah, and so that's good, Let's do it one more time. And
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so got they go that they do it again, and then after that,
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Monty comes over and comes up close to him and starts asking questions, and
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Elizabeth comes over anyway, and and anyway, they kind of got the scene
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all set and it was time for lunch, and I said to Dad,
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I said, why did you have them do it three times before you gave
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any instruction? He said, sometimes it's helpful for the actors to know that
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they may need some help. You know, that's brilliant. That's actually pretty
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brilliant. It's a brilliantly effective about it. You know. His job was
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to make the actors comfortable, but in order to give them advice, the
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advice has to be welcome. If he goes over and says, no,
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no, why don't you go here? And you go there and do that?
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Anyway, it's just a little lesson in directing. But on that day
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he introduced me to Elizabeth on the set, I mean, and she was,
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without question, in my mind, the most beautiful person on the planet,
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you know. And then as we're getting for lunch, Elizabeth walks over
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said would you like to go to lunch? So I found myself walking down
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the streets of the Paramount Studio. We were both seventeen, and and we
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go to the commissary and she kind of walks in, we'll be right back
19:53
after a word from our sponsor. Now back to the show, and I
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follow in her wake as the woman takes her to a corner table and all
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and then we had and she said what would you like? And I was
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kind of fumbling around with the menu, said I'm going to have a hamburger
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and a chop at milkshake. And I said that works. And so I
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had lunch with Elizabeth Taylor, which was and throughout many episodes in my book,
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because Elizabeth kept coming in and out of my life and right up to
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the very end of hers uh. And she's a she was a wonderful talent
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and great fun. That must have been just amazing. Well, listen with
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all of the I mean, you grew up in the Golden Age of Hollywood
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and you were in the midst of it. You were in the thick of
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it. Were there any actors or actresses that had a major impression on you
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in your life? Well, obviously many from on the screen m and for
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Ricky, some of the older ones, Jimmy Stewart and Henry Fond, Betty
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Davis, and I. When I started the American Film Institute, that's another
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story. As I started the American Film Institute Life Achievement Award, and you
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know, the first was John Ford and The second was James Cagney and Orson
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Welles and Jimmy Stewart and Capra and Fred Ass got on a few other names.
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Yes, yeah, and uh so I knew all of those greats.
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But I think the two who, because I had I worked with them in
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personal situations were Sidney Pottier and Jack Lemon. They were a few years older
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than I am, but more of my generation, and I I knew,
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I knew them in all aspects of their lives. We became great friends.
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But I did. I've produced and directed and wrote Separate but Equal, the
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Story of Brown versus the Board of Education, a mini series that won the
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Emmy for the Outstanding Mini Series, and I did another only I've only done
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too mini series and both won the Emmy, one with Jack and one with
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Sydney. And Jack was just this extraordinary, gifted fellow who could do drama
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and comedy and was such fun and Sydney had all all the great human qualities
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in addition to being such a pioneer in the matter of and Separate but Equal
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was about equal justice. He played Thurgood Marshall, arguing, developing and arguing
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the case again segregated schools, and the Supreme Court that led to the outline
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of segregated schools. So those two, those are two pretty pretty impressive ones,
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to say the least, both legends in their own right because you were
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in the Golden Age so much. Is there any misconceptions that people have of
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that time in Hollywood at that time in filmmaking in general, any misconceptions that
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you think that that you can think that comes to suit to your mind.
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I guess what, I don't think. I guess they are all kinds of
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conception, Alex. But one is it looks like a lot of fun.
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It's really hard work and making and making the great films, particularly though,
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uh you know, accepting those challenges, and then films are filled with adversity
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if something's going to go wrong, you know, and if you're talking from
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the director's standpoint, how do you deal with adversity? How do you deal
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with personalities? But when you tie a ribbon around it, you know,
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Turner classic movies, it's just amazing how so often you turn on and there's
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something that's just delightful, and it's that there's another phrase that's kind of part
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of the Stevens family that it involves another little story. But Dad and I
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went to the Academy Award to nineteen fifty two and I sat next to him,
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and Joseph l. Mankoitz came on the stage, who had won the
24:51
Oscar the year before for All About Eve, and he read the nominees for
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Best Director, and he said John Houston, the African Queen, William Wyler
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Detective Story, Vincent Minnelli, an American in Paris, Elia Kazan, a
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streetcar named Desire, and George Stevens a place in the Sun. It's a
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pretty good year to say that composition was stiff that year. Let's just say.
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And I wouldn't be telling you this story if John Houston had won for
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African Queen. My father won his first Oscar for his son, and we
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were writing home that night and the oscar was in the seat between us.
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He was driving the car a little old school there, and the Oscar was
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on the seat between us, and for some reason he looked at me and
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he said, you know, he said, we'll have a better idea.
25:57
What kind of a film this is? In about twenty five years now,
26:03
this is when movies came and went. There were no cinema techts there were
26:07
no DVD, there was no streaming. But he having grown up in the
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theater and having read the great plays, he understood that the important thing about
26:18
a film was would it stand the test of time? And he did not
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know that the seventeen year old sitting next to him would one day be the
26:30
founder of the American Film Institute, which is based on the idea of movies
26:36
that last and the test of time, or the Kennedy Center Honors, which
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is about artists whose work stands the test of time. But it is also
26:45
like respecting the audience. This idea of the test of time is kind of
26:52
how I frame my appreciation for my own work. For you know that that
27:00
I value in treasure. Now, how did you so since you brought up
27:04
the a FI, which is obviously a legendary institution, a film institution um
27:11
one of the greatest film schools ever to be created, as well as the
27:14
honors that you created, a lifetime a GB Award, which I watched every
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year when they came out. I started in the eighties when it's starting to
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come out, and you remember Clinton, Marty and Steven and you know,
27:26
Jack and these these guys. There was just so much fun, especially when
27:30
Robert Williams showed up UH or John Stewart or or Rickles or Rickles, I
27:37
mean destroying uh Spersese, which was in the way only Rickles could do.
27:45
So what how did you begin and what caused you to begin to create the
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AFI which is pretty pretty, you know, audacious goal to start on it.
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Well, I was after giant. I worked with my father. I
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started directing, directed Peter Gone, Alfred Hitchcock presents those kind of shows.
28:03
And then I went to work with my father on the Diary of Anne Frank
28:07
and we completed that. I was an associate producer, and then he got
28:11
behind schedule and I directed all of the location work in Amsterdam. He had
28:17
always done his own location work, so it was a big step up for
28:21
me. But I did kind of joke to my friends that I said,
28:26
I think I'm spending going to devote my entire life to becoming the second best
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film director in my family. And then Edward R. Murrow, the Great
28:37
Broadcaster, came into my life. President Kennedy had been elected and asked ed
28:44
to run the United States Information Agency, which made the Voice of America,
28:49
telling America's story abroad and they had a film division. They made three hundred
28:53
documentaries a year, and Ed wasn't satisfied with the documentaries, and he asked
29:00
me to come run the motion Picture Division of USIA. And it took me
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into the new frontier and President Kennedy. It's just a whole exhilarating new world.
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And I was making films. I mean, I was able to.
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Ed wanted a total rejuvenation of what was being done under the more staid Eisenhower
29:25
administration. And I've brought in lots of young filmmakers who went on to have
29:30
great careers, and we made wonderful films. And I love one thing about
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President Kennedy. He was so eloquent, and he was off, had wonderful
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quotes at his speeches, and one that I remember i'd written down. He
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read the ancient ancient Greek poetry, you know, and he loved to quote.
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And then he spoke of the Greek definition of happiness. We'll be right
29:56
back after a word from our sponsor, and now back to the show,
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which the ancient Greek said is the fullest use of one's powers along lines of
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excellence. And I realized that Ed Murrow and President Kennedy had put me in
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the saddle of Greek happiness. I was making films, loving what I was
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doing, a long lines of excellence and for public purpose. So uh,
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it was a wonderful Murrow and Kennedy were great influences on me at age thirty
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twenty nine and thirty when I came to that job. And then and then
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when did you actually start the FIH in nineteen sixty seven, But I had,
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you know, in the Kennedy government because now there's not much about film
30:55
going on, and I, you know, had earned some prominent It's because
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people were conscious of the films we were making and working with Murrow, and
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so people would come to me when there was an issue of film. And
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the National Endowment for the Arts was created to support the arts, the first
31:12
legislation funding for the arts. And they knew how they could give grants to
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ballet companies or symphony orchestras, but what do they do about film? And
31:26
you can't give a grant to MGM, you know. So it came to
31:30
me and I suggested an American Film Institute because I had been working with young
31:37
filmmakers and knew that we needed better opportunity and training. I was conscious of
31:42
the disappearing of our film heritage, that all the film was made on nitrate
31:49
stop from the beginning of the nineteen forties were disappearing, no catching on fire
31:57
or in great archive fires or you know. So we started this film rescue
32:04
program at A five and I was asked to run it. Actually Gregor Repeck
32:09
was the first chairman, and Sydney Pottier, to bring his name up again,
32:14
was vice chairman of A five when we started it. Now, at
32:17
that time, it correct me if I'm long. There weren't that many film
32:22
schools or programs in the country at all. Right in the sixth or several
32:27
there, you know, UCLA and USC had film programs, Columbia, an
32:31
NYU, maybe a few others, but they were part of four year courses.
32:37
We had a theory, I had a theory that what we needed was
32:42
a bridge from education to the profession. And so we called our students fellows
32:49
and they came for two years to gain that ad a knowledgele you weren't required
32:59
to have been a film student. Uh, you know. I was as
33:01
interested in what they were going to bring to the screen as to whether they
33:07
knew how to run a moviola. You know, among our first outstanding students,
33:14
one was Terence Malick, and Terry had made one little thirteen minute film,
33:22
I think, in the back of a taxi cab that he had.
33:25
He was a Rhodes scholar. He was teaching philosophy at MIT. Ha been
33:31
a journalist. He was going to bring something to the screen. And another
33:37
was an art student in Philadelphia who we gave a grant to make a little
33:44
film called The Grandmother, which is a picture, a perfect little film about
33:47
a grandmother. It was quite weird. And then he came to a FI
33:52
and his name was David Lynch. Where you were going with that? Ahead
33:57
of me? I was ahead of you on that one second you said weird
34:00
and I already felt that was David coming in. I mean, yeah,
34:04
who are some kids for the audience? Can you kind of talk a little
34:06
bit about who the alumni are, because you have, you know, the
34:09
AFI has popped out some of cinema's best tours and best filmmaker. Yeah,
34:16
Janat Kaminsky, the cinematographer who's course as all of you in Spielberg's films,
34:23
Um Darren Aronowsky, Caleb Desh and Noll who's with one of the first fellows
34:30
and is still the top cinematographer. Um uh uh oh gosh. And somebody
34:38
the woman who directed Koda. Oh yeah, yes, she's there and just
34:46
maybe outstanding. I wish I had had the list in front of me,
34:50
but those are a few of them, memory, but just many, many
34:57
wonderful filmmakers are from Swick and Marsh had it. I've had it on the
35:02
show. I just such a wonderful Oh, such a wonderful soul. Oh,
35:06
he's such a wonderful It's like talking when I had him on the show,
35:08
it was like talking to the Church of cinema. So just the reverence
35:15
like yourself, the reverence for cinema is remarkable. You mentioned that you worked
35:19
on Alfred Hitchcock Presents as a director. Am I am I fair to say
35:22
that you met mister Hitchcock and spoke to him and I worked with him in
35:27
a way. Indeed, yes, oh please, just have to tell me
35:30
some stories about Alfred please, yes, but actually only to say only almost
35:37
to say hello when I was directing Alfred Hitchcock, because he would busy making
35:43
Psycho or something. But he had a wonderful woman. Joe and Harrison,
35:46
this one one who ran it and I really worked through Joan. But then
35:52
when I started the AFI, Hitchcock would come and do wonderful seminars and if
36:00
I he was just so uh you so precise about moviemaking and wanted to simplify
36:08
it. And I remember him saying, uh, how important the screenplay is?
36:15
And uh he said once the screenplay uh is right? He says,
36:23
it's automatic. Uh. And then somebody said, well, why why don't
36:30
you let somebody else then go direct it? He said, they may screw
36:34
it up. And that's roll away he used to speak. Remember, we
36:43
honored him with the AFI Live Achievement Award show. Uh and uh. You
36:50
know he has been very much at the end of his career. He died
36:55
the next year. Uh and uh. But he is What you see is
37:01
what you get with hitch h That's that manner and attitude. H is who
37:12
he is. UM. As a director, we all go through times that
37:16
the we feel like the world is gonna come crash down around us on set
37:22
during a production. What was that out of all the projects you've been on,
37:25
or been on your father's set or your set, what was the biggest
37:30
calamity or thing that you obstacle that came across and how did you overcome it
37:34
in the day. Gosh, I've been trying to think of my father's films.
37:38
They were uh so frequent. But if you this is not right in
37:46
the line, but I'll tell you a story of his and the story of
37:50
mine. Um the day we were going to shoot the scene where Jack Palance
37:57
guns down stone Wall Tory in front of graft and Saloon in Shane, which
38:05
is hast to be one of the three. I don't know what the other
38:07
two are most famous gunshots in films that dad had this idea of he wanted
38:21
the muddy street and then you know, and he was looking for clouds up
38:24
there in the Tetons and he got there and it was a Saturday, and
38:29
they hadn't gotten that they've watered the street, but it was not, and
38:32
he did not and he was willing to send the whole crew home for Saturday,
38:37
bring them back on Sunday. And he said, get water from the
38:40
river. I want this street flooded. And if you remember Stonewall Tory,
38:45
the little Southerner when he gets off his horse and starts walking towards the saloon
38:52
where Jack Balance is standing on the boardwalk in front of it. He's sliding
38:57
through this mud footsteps there's unsteady. But her dad, that was a disaster,
39:05
you know, he knew how important that scene was to him. He
39:08
decided to send the crew home at whatever cost and bring them back the next
39:13
day because that scene had to be perfect. When I was working with Sidney
39:20
Potier, and this is more personal, I had been doing a lot of
39:29
stuff since Peter Gunn had founded the AFI Kennedy Center honors this and that,
39:35
and for the actually the stepuate equal was the first time I had been directing.
39:39
I'd produced and written The Murder of Mary Fagan with Jack Lemon, which
39:45
one the Emmy. Now I'm doing this and I hadn't. Sydney believed in
39:49
me, loved the script. Both Jack and Sydney refused to do television that
39:53
based on scripts I handed them. We'll be right back after a word from
39:59
our sponsor, and now back to the show. They agreed to do television
40:07
in these instances, and we were filming the scene. Sydney has been down
40:15
in the South and seeing the trouble there and has gotten people in Clarendon County
40:22
African Americans to agree to file a suit that would become part of the Brown
40:27
Versus Board of Education legal case. He comes back up to New York,
40:31
where the NAACP Legal Defense Fund law offices are. He comes in late.
40:39
Several of the lawyers are playing poker, and you know, and and Sydney
40:45
comes in, puts his stuff down, comes and sits down with them and
40:47
plays a hand of poker before we're telling him what the story is in South
40:53
Carolina, and I hadn't seen. Excuse me, I'm going to take a
40:58
glass of water place. Of course. Of course I adn't seeing the comedies
41:07
that Sydney had made with Cosby. You know, we're really great stuff.
41:12
And Sydney started doing some kind of comic stuff that it wasn't what I was
41:16
expecting. And I kind of had cut and had passed him to change the
41:22
lighting, made an excuse and kind of walked around it. The only place
41:27
we could find was a storeroom with lights and junk and everything. And I
41:31
walked in with Sydney, and this is the two of us, and I
41:35
said, Sydney, I said, I'm not quite sure what we're doing in
41:39
this scene. And I don't think I phrased it very well. And that
41:45
wonderful face looked at me with those eyes and he said, well, what
41:52
is it that you want done in this scene? And I saw this,
41:57
the whole thing falling apart. You know, it's at the first kind of
42:02
direction I give him, you know, And and I just stood there and
42:07
we looked at one another, and I don't know where it came from,
42:12
but I said, I see their good Marshall as a man with secrets.
42:19
Oh, Sydney says, when that is what you want, say that word.
42:28
We went back to work and we never had a false moment the rest
42:32
of the way. But it's it's it's you know, I've looked back on
42:37
it thankfully of you know, if I faltered there, it could have been
42:43
uncomfortable going forward, right. You know. It's really interesting. That's such
42:46
a great thing because each actor is his or her own world and they work
42:53
in a very specific way. And it's really interesting because if you have two
42:59
or three or four actors in a scene and they all are working in different
43:01
styles and different ways. As a director, it's difficult to You can't just
43:06
do a broad direction. You got to do this to that one that one's
43:08
being method, that one's not being method, And let's not even get into
43:13
the personalities and egos of the situation. It's a very interesting job directors.
43:19
And a very good rule of thumb is if you have something difficult, I
43:24
mean, if it's everything, fine, but if there's something and you want
43:28
to address something with one actor, If you know things are difficult and you
43:35
want to address something with one actor, how to break it up and then
43:38
quietly take the actor aside and talk to them one on one. Yeah,
43:45
you don't want to embarrass an actor or you know, in front of the
43:51
other actors or you know, then they might feel they have to dig in
43:55
or justify themselves. So a private attention to individual actors is very important.
44:04
Now, with all the professional accomplishments you've had in your life, which is
44:07
the one that you are the most proud of? Gosh, well, I'll
44:15
pick one for you. It's a film called It's a film called George Stephens,
44:20
a filmmaker's journey. They did shortly after my father's death, and it's
44:25
a film biography of my father. And I'm pleased to say that some friends
44:35
and colleagues and some strangers say that it's the best documentary about a filmmaker ever
44:40
and it was so important to me and I am so happy that it you
44:46
know, I applied those rules that I learned from him. Just work on
44:52
it until you get it right, and to respect the audience. Let the
44:55
audience bring something to the film. And that film is going to celebrate its
45:02
fortieth anniversary next year. And it was on Turnasic Movies a few nights ago.
45:09
And uh, and yeah, I think your audience bally people who are
45:15
interested in filmmaking. It's called George Stevens a Filmmaker's Journey. It's on the
45:20
Criteria Terry and Channel. I think it's on HBO Max or their way used
45:24
to see it and it uh, you know, and I was able to
45:31
interview I mean, Jimmy Stewart and Henry Fonda and Katherine Hepburn and Warren Beatty
45:37
and directors Houston and Mammoonion and Capra. It's him for a film lover or
45:46
even sae. Yeah, it's a smorgas Park without question. Um, if
45:52
you could go back in time and give your seventeen year old self, who's
45:59
just finish having lunch with Elizabeth Taylor some advice. What advice would that be?
46:07
Ohoh gosh, it's it's it's pretty a U plane. But find something
46:15
to do that you love, you know, that's that. And if it's
46:19
making movies, be prepared for a tough road. I know you on your
46:23
show are often exploring with people, how do you get somebody to look at
46:30
my movie, pay for my movie, read my script? You know,
46:34
And there's there's no short answer for that. It's whatever the circumstances. You
46:40
have to work with those circumstances. Um but uh, but to stick with
46:50
it. And and you may find along the way that you thought I want
46:54
to be an actor, uh, and you find out later you know,
46:58
I'd like to be a costume designer and I've seen that and or director or
47:05
whatever. And you know, so have some flexibility. Don't kind of set
47:09
your say, oh, you know, I'm going to be a director,
47:15
because you may find that that may not be your strongest suit. So kind
47:20
of determination and flexibility, and always to be reminded once you get some control
47:30
and gaining control over your work if you're a director is very important and very
47:37
hard to achieve. But once you have it, respect the audience. I
47:43
remember my father saying, and it's from another era. But he he made
47:49
me wonderful pictures of the early forties Woman of the Year, the first Spencer
47:53
Tracy picture, Joel McCray and Jean Arthur, and the More the Marrier,
48:00
Carrie Grant and Geane Arthur and Ronald Coleman. There's just so many pictures.
48:08
But he talked about they would open in the Archaeo City Music Hall, which
48:15
has five thousand seats of a picture of him in front of it when Penny
48:20
Serenade was opening a picture showed at the Turner Classic Film Festival last week with
48:25
Irene Dunn and Carrie Grant. But he said, there's something when five thousand
48:30
minds come together. He said, they closed the circuit. They bring their
48:36
intelligence, they bring their curiosity, and the link is closed between the filmmaker
48:43
and the audience. And just to have that idea that the audience. He
48:47
said about Shane, which you know, classic Western and all, somebody was
48:52
trying to make it a little fancy, and he said, you know,
48:54
I think I made Shane for the truck driver. An arc Saw says he
49:00
spends a day alone driving his truck and he may not be able to articulate
49:07
his thoughts. But he's thinking, and he's curious about things, and he
49:10
has ideas, and I want to leave a little something for him to do
49:15
when he comes to the movie. Let him bring something to it. Oh,
49:20
it's beautiful, beautiful, That is really really beautiful. You know,
49:25
since you've been raised in Hollywood, have you've seen a change from the Golden
49:30
Age to where we are today? Where do you think the future of the
49:36
industry with all this new technology, this new generation that's coming up that is
49:42
not as in love with movies as maybe my generation or your generation was,
49:47
because so many other options for entertainment are out there. Where do you think
49:52
the future is for Hollywood moving forward? Well, it's very much up in
49:58
the air. And we'll be right back after a word from our sponsor,
50:07
and now back to the show. I'll tell you what I hope. It's
50:10
I hope that the movie going experience revives itself, that there's something more than
50:17
Marvel comics and the big you know, pictures that people love for a good
50:23
reason, but that right now it's almost only those that are flourishing in today's
50:32
theatrical you know. And I want people to see pictures on the big screen,
50:38
that idea of my father with five thousand people, if it's five hundred
50:43
or a thousand seeing it with other people. So I'm hoping that that will
50:50
renourish itself. And of course there are values to streaming. People. Our
50:55
sets are getting bigger at home, and it's a better experience than it used
51:00
to be. Uh but it's it's and more kind of good directors and writers
51:07
are now working for streaming and television. Yeah, because they can tell stories
51:14
that they want to and that and my plans for the immediate future because it
51:20
is a way to tell ambitious stories. Uh So, now we have this
51:25
writer's strike, which is I think very serious because I think the writers are
51:36
really feeling genuine and I'm of course a member of the Writer's Guild of displacement
51:43
that there are just there are less jobs and people are finding way and they
51:46
kind of fear that AI They're going to start asking AI to write a script
51:52
or polish a script or whatever. And so I'm very much interested in the
51:58
writers abolishing a place. But it has changed so much that it's going to
52:06
be difficult, but very important that the studios and the writers and the other
52:12
guills come together in a way that's fair. I mean, there are people,
52:17
you know, making fifty million dollars a year off of the work that
52:28
these writers are doing, and there has to be some way to find a
52:32
fair situation that allows this fabulous medium that it is so rich and provides so
52:42
much for it to flourish. And it isn't it always the way though,
52:46
that the machine will always take advantage of the artist if let left Alane to
52:52
its own devices. I think that is true, I think right. And
52:59
that's why the union are important, and that's why you know, collective and
53:01
all that stuff with with with what's going on. I agree, And it's
53:05
more I've spoken. I've spoken to so many writers on the show who are
53:08
just saying it's just becoming more and more difficult to make a living, not
53:13
even become rich, just make a living in the business. Directors as well,
53:17
because of becoming more gig orientated, like here, here's a flat fee,
53:22
thank you very much, out the door you go, and that there
53:25
was a job every week, maybe, but yeah, but there isn't.
53:30
Director people who used to direct television kind of where I did long ago,
53:37
there were three networks or four networks with the whole season, what twenty thirty
53:44
episodes? You know that's kind of diluted. Now. Someone told me that
53:51
a prominent agent speaking to two days ago, that I think the last strike
53:57
was two thousand and eight, seven or eight, and that year the networks
54:04
shot fifty five pilots. Right this year there were fifteen pilots. So you
54:14
know, it's all changing, and I hope there's some smart enough people sitting
54:19
at the top and working for the unions that can find a balance that's gonna,
54:27
as I say, nourish this medium that we all love so much.
54:30
I agree with you one hundred percent. I don't want to I grew up
54:34
in the I grew up in the video store days. I worked in a
54:37
video store, and that's where I fell in love with movies. And yeah,
54:40
I mean I was in high school and I rented movies and that's where
54:44
I discovered giant and because I could see them all and I just started and
54:47
that's where I fell in love with movies and became decided to become a director.
54:52
But I worked in a movie theater, and movies were you know,
54:53
I remember my first movie in the theater and thinks, but my children don't
54:58
like I've taken to the theaters, but they're just like, it's nice,
55:00
but it's not as important. They did not grow up with you. Now
55:05
you're going to have the first adult generation that did not go grow up going
55:10
to the movies and correct and it's something that's going to have to be managed
55:16
and you know, and the idea you can look at a movie on your
55:21
phone with all due respect, no matter how clean and Chris the phone is.
55:25
I mean, it's it's it's a travesty to watch Taxi Driver on your
55:28
iPhone. I mean, seriously, I mean Our Giants, for God's sakes,
55:31
it's the movie itself, it's called Giants. You should not be watching
55:35
it on a small screen. It's to watch a taxi driver in a taxi
55:40
essentially, that's a well, that's a different experience depending on what street you're
55:45
driving down and who's driving. George, what do you hope to leave behind
55:52
as a legacy in film with the work that you've done over the course of
55:57
your your life and career. Well again, I'll encourage people to read My
56:01
Place in the Sun or listen to it just come out on an audiobook.
56:07
It's hard for me to recite that I Uh. From my standpoint, I
56:13
love I've loved being involved in it and and kind of aspiring all the way.
56:19
I really did kind of set for myself as standard of excellence and perhaps
56:27
made a few mistakes along the line, but every time I did it,
56:30
it was aiming high and I'm pleased that so much of it people are.
56:37
You know, I feel good that this film I made about my father forty
56:42
years ago. You know that it's still there and looking great, and we've
56:46
restored it, and so that test of time, I'm I'm respect the audience
56:55
test of time. Guy, such a beautiful place to be, my friend.
57:00
I'm going to ask a few questions I ask all my guests, Um,
57:04
what advice would you give a filmmaker trying to break into the business today?
57:10
Well, I spoke about it before, but because maybe yeah, yeah,
57:21
I would say to have a figure out where you're going, believe in
57:25
yourself and keep your eyes open and you're you're not choosing an easy path,
57:31
so you have to be prepared for doors to slam, and that make good
57:37
friends, work with friends, and set your sights high. What is the
57:44
lesson that took you the longest to learn? Whether in the film industry or
57:46
in life. I think to listen. Yeah, listening is very important.
57:57
And I think when you're young or even when you're old, depending on how
58:04
if you're stubborn or not. Uh that uh, that being a good listener.
58:12
Uh. I remember uh Jimmy Cagney saying in some context to me,
58:20
he said, well, I'm a listening actor, you know. Uh,
58:24
And I think in in any field, in politics and journalism, so many
58:32
es, but just as a human being, listen to the other person.
58:38
And three of your favorite films of all time? Oh gosh, well today
58:45
today, today, today you of you know, I like Christopher Nolan's work.
58:55
I loved Sarah Pauly's Women Talking a beautiful film. Um, and uh,
59:06
you know they're just so many So A third I think I'll just say,
59:08
because it's it's seventieth anniversary chain, great answer, my friend. And
59:15
where can people find out about your new book and what can they purchase it?
59:19
Now? At official g S I think is my Twitter, And I'm
59:25
not a huge Twitter person, but I did put on Twitter yesterday. I
59:31
came upon a letter I wrote to my father on gunga Din when I was
59:37
five five years old, and picture of him on the set. Um but
59:46
George Stephens Junior dot com is my website uh all floorcase letters U G E
59:55
R G E S T E V E N S jr dot com and an
1:00:00
Amazon you could buy the book or audible to listen. Yes, exactly,
1:00:06
George. It has been an absolute pleasure and honor speaking to you, my
1:00:09
friend. Thank you so much for not only sharing your journey and your knowledge
1:00:14
with all of us, but also for everything you've done for the film industry
1:00:17
and for the arts throughout your life. So, my friend, I appreciate
1:00:21
you so so much and thank you again and for many more things to come
1:00:24
in your future, my friend, Thank you well. Alex. I enjoy
1:00:29
talking to you. I I felt I found many shared values with you,
1:00:32
and that's always a nice conversation, a pleasure. I want to thank George
1:00:38
so much for coming on the show and dropping his knowledge bombs on the Tribe
1:00:43
today. Thank you so much, George. If you want to get links
1:00:45
to anything we spoke about in this episode, including how to get his new
1:00:47
book and over to the show notes at Indie film Hustle dot com. Ford
1:00:51
Slash six nine zero. Thank you so much for listening to guys, as
1:00:54
always, keep the hustle going, keep that dream alive, Stay safe out
1:00:59
there, and I'll use it. Thanks for listening to the Indie Film Hustle
1:01:01
podcast at Indie Film hustle dot com. That's I N D I E F
1:01:07
I L M h U S t l E dot com