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The Strange and Amazing Life of Yaphet Kotto · Movie Meltdown

• 0:19
  Speaker 1: Hi, this is Lance Henderson, and you're listening to Movie Meltdown.
• 0:22
  Speaker 2: Listen if you dare. It's showtime.
• 0:29
  Speaker 3: The following feature has been rated R by the Motion
• 0:32
  Speaker 3: Picture Association of America.
• 0:34
  Speaker 2: It is intended for mature audiences, and parental discretion is advised.
• 0:39
  Speaker 2: Our nuclear reactor pumping out one million kilowatts of power.
• 1:14
  Speaker 4: Well, it's an interesting combination of elements, making him a
• 1:16
  Speaker 4: tough little son of a bitch.
• 1:28
  Speaker 5: What's up and welcome to Movie Meltdown.
• 1:29
  Speaker 6: I am Brian. I am Lucy.
• 1:31
  Speaker 4: And we are coming to you live via digital recording
• 1:33
  Speaker 4: from Indianapolis at one of those convention things. So, Lucy,
• 1:38
  Speaker 4: how have you been?
• 1:39
  Speaker 6: I've been very well, Brian. How have you been?
• 1:41
  Speaker 2: Okay.
• 1:42
  Speaker 4: It's been a little while since I've seen you.
• 1:45
  Speaker 6: Are we, are we, I can't even, I can't even
• 1:46
  Speaker 6: do the small talk.
• 1:48
  Speaker 4: I really can't.
• 1:48
  Speaker 2: You're so excited.
• 1:49
  Speaker 6: I'm so excited. I tried. I really tried.
• 1:51
  Speaker 4: You're so excited to get to our special guest. Yes.
• 1:55
  Speaker 6: Because he's so awesome. Incredible.
• 1:58
  Speaker 4: We did just sit down with, you might know who,
• 2:01
  Speaker 4: assuming you looked at the name on this when you
• 2:03
  Speaker 4: pushed play, but yeah, this week's special guest is Yafit
• 2:07
  Speaker 4: Koto and he's amazing. And Lucy came along to join
• 2:11
  Speaker 4: in on the conversation.
• 2:12
  Speaker 6: Yes, which was incredible. So thank you for allowing me
• 2:15
  Speaker 6: to join.
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  Speaker 4: I thought, you know, if anybody would be a good
• 2:19
  Speaker 4: other party to have involved and had an extra little
• 2:22
  Speaker 4: inside track there to be like, okay, guess what? I
• 2:26
  Speaker 4: also do this thing that you might be into.
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  Speaker 6: But I didn't like do, I was an appropriate amount, right?
• 2:33
  Speaker 4: I mean, I threw it out there for you.
• 2:35
  Speaker 6: I was like, now's a good time.
• 2:36
  Speaker 5: Let's go ahead and do it.
• 2:37
  Speaker 4: Because we know we're going to do it, you know.
• 2:38
  Speaker 4: We know we're going to at least do the intro here.
• 2:40
  Speaker 6: Hey, guess what?
• 2:41
  Speaker 4: So I thought it was a nicely worked in thing
• 2:44
  Speaker 4: and he got an invite.
• 2:45
  Speaker 2: So.
• 2:46
  Speaker 4: Yes. And he can come play with your horses.
• 2:47
  Speaker 6: He can. He's a horseman, which I love.
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  Speaker 4: Yeah, we didn't really get into that too much in there,
• 2:51
  Speaker 4: but afterwards he was talking about having horses.
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  Speaker 7: Yeah.
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  Speaker 4: He's an interesting character.
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  Speaker 1: I've just, I've never, and I asked you this when
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: we were standing in the elevator afterward, but I was
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: just sort of sitting there jumping out of my skin
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  Speaker 1: the entire time because I was mesmerized and was so,
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: I mean, it was just like the history, his history
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  Speaker 1: is just.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah.
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  Speaker 6: So compelling. And he's such a fascinating person. And there
• 3:15
  Speaker 6: was so much insight. And that was the thing.
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  Speaker 4: Like, there's all these other big names that they bring
• 3:19
  Speaker 4: to these things. But I'm always like the one zeroing
• 3:21
  Speaker 4: in on stuff like Yafet Kota. I'm just like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.
• 3:25
  Speaker 5: Yafet's coming.
• 3:27
  Speaker 4: I need to talk to him.
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  Speaker 1: And the things that he said that, you know, I
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: guess to him are just sort of throwaways were to
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: me just the most fascinating things I'd ever heard. I mean,
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  Speaker 1: to start out in the actor's studio alongside Marlon Brando
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  Speaker 1: and Marilyn Monroe, it's just mind boggling.
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  Speaker 4: And how clueless he was going into all of this,
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  Speaker 4: like to his own benefit, really, as you'll hear, it
• 3:49
  Speaker 4: becomes his thing. thing that propels him into the industry.
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  Speaker 1: And I'm pretty sure he told you he gave you
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: a scoop or two. I think there's some exclusives in
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: the interview. I mean, he said that, you know, for
• 3:59
  Speaker 1: decades he didn't really do any press.
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  Speaker 6: So now the stories are.
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  Speaker 4: Starting to come out. We are, you know, the most
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  Speaker 4: awesome of all presses. So this is where you come
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  Speaker 4: to when you have cool stories.
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  Speaker 1: So yeah, I was amazed. I just felt like I was, yeah,
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  Speaker 1: on the Dick Cavett show or something.
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  Speaker 4: Really? We're that level of awesome.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah.
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  Speaker 4: So we should just get to it? That's what you're saying?
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  Speaker 6: Yeah, pretty much.
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  Speaker 5: I think so too.
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  Speaker 4: Let's just go talk to Yafat right now.
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  Speaker 2: All right.
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  Speaker 4: I was going to start at the beginning with you,
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  Speaker 4: and I guess born in New York, were you?
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  Speaker 2: Right.
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  Speaker 4: First off, I guess, because I've heard so much about
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  Speaker 4: your family history, what did you know about your family
• 5:00
  Speaker 4: history when you were a kid? Did you know a
• 5:03
  Speaker 4: lot of what you learned later?
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  Speaker 2: I knew what my father and my mother were saying,
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  Speaker 2: and I'll doubt that the Bell family from Africa are
• 5:11
  Speaker 2: related to the royal family of England. Yeah.
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  Speaker 4: And....
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  Speaker 2: My great-great-grandfather was Alexander Bell, who was subsequently hung by
• 5:23
  Speaker 2: the Germans in 1912 and stuff like that. Just a
• 5:27
  Speaker 2: number of things that I've gone over in my book,
• 5:29
  Speaker 2: The Royalties. I don't know whether Buckingham Palace wants to
• 5:36
  Speaker 2: get down with that, but the whole family couldn't be.
• 5:39
  Speaker 2: And not only that, if you look at the Magnabel family,
• 5:45
  Speaker 2: You'll see the royal family there on the internet.
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  Speaker 4: So you knew that much when you were younger?
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  Speaker 2: Yes.
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  Speaker 4: I guess your parents neither were really interested in entertainment
• 6:00
  Speaker 4: or certainly weren't working in the arts. There was like
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  Speaker 4: a nurse.
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  Speaker 2: First of all, my father was a Jew. He went
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  Speaker 2: to the rabbi. We went to a rabbinic school in Hong.
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  Speaker 2: And my mother was a Panamanian woman who went on
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  Speaker 2: to the army to become an army officer, United States Army.
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  Speaker 2: And those kinds of people being West Indians and conservative Jews, entertainment.
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  Speaker 4: It wasn't on the radar.
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  Speaker 2: Wouldn't even talk about it. I mean, look at you,
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  Speaker 2: you're crazy. You said, I want to go become an actor.
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  Speaker 4: So did they, like when you first, were getting interested
• 6:43
  Speaker 4: in that and posed that question? Were they just like,
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  Speaker 4: what are you thinking? Like, was it really something they
• 6:49
  Speaker 4: wanted to fight against?
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  Speaker 2: Those members of my family are very much like what
• 6:55
  Speaker 2: is called white royalty in this country. You don't see
• 7:00
  Speaker 2: them getting married. You see the women in newspapers announcing
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  Speaker 2: they're going to marry the son of corporate big deal
• 7:09
  Speaker 2: company Joe, okay? That's the kind of family that I
• 7:14
  Speaker 2: grew up with. So when you mention those kind of things,
• 7:17
  Speaker 2: no one reacts. You know, just pretend like you didn't
• 7:20
  Speaker 2: say anything. Even when it starts really happening, still, to
• 7:24
  Speaker 2: this day, my mother never said to me that, oh,
• 7:27
  Speaker 2: that was a good movie you were in, or, oh, wow,
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  Speaker 2: you're an actor. Just like you don't know what, it's
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  Speaker 2: like you didn't do anything.
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  Speaker 4: So what, what turned it for you that you really
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  Speaker 4: wanted to get into that? When it wasn't something you
• 7:41
  Speaker 4: were raised around, you know, being in the industry or anything,
• 7:44
  Speaker 4: what made you want to pursue at least acting in general?
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  Speaker 2: A series of events that started with someone who was
• 7:53
  Speaker 2: born here, James Dean. I went to see a picture
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  Speaker 2: when I was 15 years old entitled The Rebels Out
• 8:01
  Speaker 2: of Course and left the movie set of Blown into
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  Speaker 2: another country. And then later on as I was older,
• 8:10
  Speaker 2: looking for a job in Manhattan, during my time looking
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  Speaker 2: for a job, on Times Square they used to have
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  Speaker 2: these daters that you could do anything, go see anything.
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  Speaker 2: And when I asked them, looking for a job, I
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  Speaker 2: couldn't find one. I went to see a movie called
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  Speaker 2: On the Waterfront. And then when I saw that, that
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  Speaker 2: sealed it for me. I said, I'm going to become
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  Speaker 2: an actor. I want to be able to do what
• 8:38
  Speaker 2: these guys did. Little did I know, both of them
• 8:40
  Speaker 2: are from Indiana. Marlon Brando and James Dean, which is second.
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  Speaker 2: Blessing to the state to have such geniuses come from
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  Speaker 2: this one state.
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  Speaker 4: They always reference that era of when acting changed. At
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  Speaker 4: the time, I guess, did you feel like this was
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  Speaker 4: something new and different? It's that Marlon Brando, James Dean,
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  Speaker 4: that whole new wave of a different style of acting
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  Speaker 4: that came about.
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  Speaker 2: I wasn't aware of the style. I only was aware
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  Speaker 2: of the word, the active studio. And then I became
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  Speaker 2: a member of the active studio. Didn't even realize I'd
• 9:18
  Speaker 2: become a member of the active studio. I became aware
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  Speaker 2: of the style now that the system that created the
• 9:25
  Speaker 2: style is gone. The system is no longer here anymore.
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  Speaker 2: But I became aware of the active studio and it
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  Speaker 2: became something that The quest of every young actor then
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  Speaker 2: was to say, I am a member of the actor's studio.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, that's just fascinating to me. I love that they
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  Speaker 1: were influenced. I mean, they must have still been looming large. James,
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  Speaker 1: you must have been looming large at the actor's studio
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  Speaker 1: when you were there. What years were you at the
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: actor's studio?
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  Speaker 2: I went to the actor's studio around 53 or 54. Oh, wow.
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  Speaker 4: Yeah, and 55.
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  Speaker 2: So very shortly after you was there. Molly Kazan was there.
• 10:02
  Speaker 2: Molly Kazan was still there. And Gatch and Lee Strasberg
• 10:14
  Speaker 2: and Molly. It was quite by accident, me getting in.
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  Speaker 2: How did it happen? I was trying to find an
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  Speaker 2: acting school to go to in the Bronx, calling one
• 10:24
  Speaker 2: after another, and couldn't find one. And finally I called one.
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  Speaker 2: He said, the actor's studio. I said, oh, wow. I
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  Speaker 2: didn't know about the actor's studio. I had never even
• 10:36
  Speaker 2: been to except a couple of movies. So I called
• 10:39
  Speaker 2: him up and I said, how much did it cost
• 10:41
  Speaker 2: to go here? They said nothing. I said, wow. Does
• 10:46
  Speaker 2: it cost anything to go? No, you just come. So
• 10:48
  Speaker 2: I and auditioned with the girls that were on the phone.
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  Speaker 2: So I told my mother, I found the active studio,
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  Speaker 2: I go down there, and I audition, and with Diana Sands,
• 11:04
  Speaker 2: who was in The Raisin in the Sun, and written
• 11:10
  Speaker 2: by a piece called, by Adrienne Kennedy, she wrote a
• 11:14
  Speaker 2: thing called The Funny House of a Negro. And we
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  Speaker 2: did it at the active studio. And I used that
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  Speaker 2: for my audition. Well, later on, I got a call
• 11:24
  Speaker 2: about two weeks later. We're going to take you in
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  Speaker 2: as an observer first, and then we'll gradually bring you
• 11:30
  Speaker 2: into a class. And I was in it. I didn't
• 11:33
  Speaker 2: think it was in the church basement in Manhattan. I
• 11:36
  Speaker 2: didn't think much of it. I came to find out
• 11:41
  Speaker 2: a lot about it later on from Marilyn Monroe. who
• 11:48
  Speaker 2: I became friendly with. And I didn't even know she
• 11:52
  Speaker 2: was Meryl. One day we were walking up from Manhattan,
• 11:55
  Speaker 2: she was on her way to the studio because she
• 11:57
  Speaker 2: was studying there. And she said she's a big star.
• 12:02
  Speaker 2: So I looked at her, she was crazy.
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  Speaker 4: Every actor thinks they're a big star.
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  Speaker 2: I didn't even know she was an actor. I thought
• 12:10
  Speaker 2: she was this fat, knock-kneed lady that was absolutely insane.
• 12:16
  Speaker 2: wasn't attracted to me, and I never saw her in
• 12:20
  Speaker 2: any movie. I just saw her in the class. And
• 12:25
  Speaker 2: we were walking up the street, she's wearing these black sunglasses,
• 12:31
  Speaker 2: and a fellow classmate, she says to me, you know,
• 12:36
  Speaker 2: if I take off these glasses, you won't be able
• 12:37
  Speaker 2: to walk with me anymore. So, again, thinking that she's nuts,
• 12:44
  Speaker 2: I said, well, take them off, let's see what happens. Well,
• 12:47
  Speaker 2: she whips off these glasses, and we didn't get 10
• 12:50
  Speaker 2: feet before people start screaming from the street, cars going by. Marilyn!
• 12:55
  Speaker 2: They start charging. Three to four or five hundred people
• 12:59
  Speaker 2: collected in a few minutes. And she said, she gave
• 13:04
  Speaker 2: me some cab money. She said, because we're still walking,
• 13:07
  Speaker 2: take this cab and you'll get there. But I'm going
• 13:10
  Speaker 2: to be, they're going to take me away from you.
• 13:11
  Speaker 2: You won't be able to walk with me. So when
• 13:14
  Speaker 2: she was gone, I took the cab money and I Caleb,
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  Speaker 2: I was blown away. So I'm sitting in the back
• 13:20
  Speaker 2: of the room, and I'm sitting next to this really
• 13:23
  Speaker 2: short guy, about as big as this chair, who's really powerful,
• 13:27
  Speaker 2: and he's got this bulldog on his feet. And we're
• 13:30
  Speaker 2: listening to the class, and I lean over, and I say,
• 13:33
  Speaker 2: you see that woman up there? And he says, yeah.
• 13:36
  Speaker 2: He says, that's a movie star. Really? In here? So
• 13:41
  Speaker 2: I said, yeah. What's a movie star doing here? So
• 13:44
  Speaker 2: I says, I don't know. He says, you know, we
• 13:46
  Speaker 2: And I told him the incident. He said, oh, wow.
• 13:49
  Speaker 2: He said, after class, you and I will wait. Brother,
• 13:52
  Speaker 2: come out, and we'll go up to you and get autographs.
• 13:54
  Speaker 2: I said, OK. Class is over now, so we leave
• 13:56
  Speaker 2: the basement. We go out on the sidewalk. And as
• 13:59
  Speaker 2: we got in the sidewalk, these people are going, Marlon,
• 14:02
  Speaker 2: Marlon Brando. They're running over to him, and they get
• 14:05
  Speaker 2: his autograph. So I said, what's going on here? He says,
• 14:09
  Speaker 2: all right. When we start seating, I realized that every
• 14:12
  Speaker 2: single person in that school or Montgomery Clift, who was there,
• 14:16
  Speaker 2: and others. All of them were movie stars. And that's
• 14:22
  Speaker 2: when I was absolutely, totally blown away. I didn't realize that.
• 14:27
  Speaker 2: I'm the kid from the home. I only saw a
• 14:30
  Speaker 2: couple of movies, but I didn't know these people, these
• 14:35
  Speaker 2: giant stars. And then I found out that Marlon was
• 14:38
  Speaker 2: studying at my aunt's dance studio in Manhattan. And then
• 14:43
  Speaker 2: I saw him again there, and I saw James Dean there,
• 14:47
  Speaker 2: and Ozzie Davis, God rest his soul, there, and others,
• 14:50
  Speaker 2: Eartha Kitt. I started seeing, I had an atmosphere of
• 14:54
  Speaker 2: the studio on the east side, and Sevilla's dance studio
• 15:00
  Speaker 2: on the right, Sevilla Port dance studio. Strange. That was
• 15:09
  Speaker 2: my introduction to, I'm going to shoot picture industry.
• 15:12
  Speaker 4: Seeing all that, I mean, you're still kind of a
• 15:14
  Speaker 4: kid coming up, hadn't been exposed to any of it.
• 15:17
  Speaker 4: Was that more daunting, or did you see that and go,
• 15:20
  Speaker 4: I want that level of celebrity?
• 15:22
  Speaker 2: No. Yeah. No, I, there was a bar in Manhattan
• 15:31
  Speaker 2: that they all went to. Yeah. And all the movie
• 15:35
  Speaker 2: actors in New York, I went to, I forget the
• 15:38
  Speaker 2: name of the bar, it's on 8th Avenue. I started
• 15:41
  Speaker 2: going there a lot just to be around them. Met
• 15:45
  Speaker 2: Christopher Plummer there, Paul Newman. So every night I went there,
• 15:49
  Speaker 2: they would be in there eating and standing at the bar.
• 15:52
  Speaker 2: They were all over the place. And I wondered how
• 15:54
  Speaker 2: people in New York didn't know that in this particular bar,
• 15:58
  Speaker 2: Downey's Restaurant, I didn't know. Why don't they know that
• 16:05
  Speaker 2: all of these movie actors were in Downey's? So I
• 16:08
  Speaker 2: was going there every night. And they were all eating
• 16:12
  Speaker 2: dinner at the bar, and I befriended a number of them.
• 16:15
  Speaker 2: And so when I went home, my mother would say,
• 16:18
  Speaker 2: where were you? I said, I was down in the
• 16:21
  Speaker 2: bar with Paul Newman. She said, you're crazy. So every
• 16:26
  Speaker 2: night I could report back to what these big, giant
• 16:30
  Speaker 2: stars were doing. And no one knew in my neighborhood
• 16:33
  Speaker 2: anywhere that during the night I was with superstars from Hollywood.
• 16:36
  Speaker 2: And they thought I was just going crazy and making
• 16:38
  Speaker 2: up this stuff. You know, Montgomery Clift told me this.
• 16:41
  Speaker 2: It was, what? What are you talking about? That's amazing.
• 16:44
  Speaker 4: That's incredible.
• 16:45
  Speaker 1: I mean, it must have made it seem so much
• 16:46
  Speaker 1: more attainable. I mean, that seems like it would be
• 16:49
  Speaker 1: really demystifying that.
• 16:50
  Speaker 6: It's just people.
• 16:51
  Speaker 2: That's right, because I would question them about California and state.
• 16:57
  Speaker 2: And they all knew that I was trying to get
• 17:00
  Speaker 2: in the business. And all of them were helpful to me.
• 17:02
  Speaker 2: Every single actor that I talked to were helpful. These
• 17:06
  Speaker 2: were big-name people. Oh, you do this, you do that.
• 17:09
  Speaker 2: And very talkative. Chris McCormick was very talkative. You know, very,
• 17:15
  Speaker 2: you know, he'd have a couple of shots and he'd
• 17:18
  Speaker 2: tell you his life story. So that was a benefit.
• 17:21
  Speaker 2: But it became my secret. I never told any other
• 17:24
  Speaker 2: actor in New York or any person where I would
• 17:27
  Speaker 2: go or who I was meeting and what I knew
• 17:30
  Speaker 2: about the industry. Wow.
• 17:32
  Speaker 4: They'd come try to steal all your secrets.
• 17:34
  Speaker 2: Well, it was hanging out there. You know, I would not.
• 17:37
  Speaker 4: Cutting in on your time.
• 17:38
  Speaker 2: I took a couple of girls there to impress them. Well, sure.
• 17:42
  Speaker 2: We're old friends. And we had become friends because they
• 17:47
  Speaker 2: were all going there every night.
• 17:49
  Speaker 4: Well, at that point, I guess you're doing more stage acting.
• 17:53
  Speaker 4: Were you specific? Was it just like assumed that film
• 17:56
  Speaker 4: was the next step? Or did you specifically take an
• 17:58
  Speaker 4: interest in film acting?
• 17:59
  Speaker 2: I didn't take an interest in anything. I was not
• 18:03
  Speaker 2: trying to become an actor. And it's You start becoming
• 18:08
  Speaker 2: like the people you're hanging out with. You start becoming
• 18:11
  Speaker 2: like Brando. You start becoming like Dean. And all those
• 18:15
  Speaker 2: guys were rebels at the time. In fact, I heard
• 18:17
  Speaker 2: this story that Marlon refused to audition for parts. I
• 18:23
  Speaker 2: started doing that. I started getting parts. I would come
• 18:29
  Speaker 2: with the script and give it back to them and say,
• 18:32
  Speaker 2: I don't want to audition for this. Why? It started
• 18:34
  Speaker 2: by saying, I don't feel I'm not in the movement.
• 18:37
  Speaker 2: That was my motivation. And for some reason, they became
• 18:41
  Speaker 2: enamored with this style. That was a style that people
• 18:45
  Speaker 2: who didn't care looked upon, oh, well, he must really know.
• 18:49
  Speaker 2: What do you feel about the script? And so I
• 18:52
  Speaker 2: started getting work that I pretended I didn't want. It's
• 18:55
  Speaker 2: not that I had this plan to get work. I
• 18:58
  Speaker 2: was just copying the older guys who seemed to have
• 19:02
  Speaker 2: gotten someplace by being these rebel, didn't audition.
• 19:08
  Speaker 4: You create a mystique at that point. You're just like,
• 19:10
  Speaker 4: what is this guy? He's got something going on.
• 19:13
  Speaker 2: I was mysterious for sure, just like they were. I'd
• 19:16
  Speaker 2: go to auditions, sit in the back. I refused to
• 19:18
  Speaker 2: get pictures or resume. No one knew who I was. Suddenly,
• 19:22
  Speaker 2: around New York, I was getting this name. It was
• 19:26
  Speaker 2: Yafit Koto. And I didn't even know I was getting
• 19:30
  Speaker 2: a name or reputation.
• 19:33
  Speaker 4: So did that lead to more stage work or did
• 19:35
  Speaker 4: you immediately, because I know you started kind of working
• 19:37
  Speaker 4: your way into TV at that point. Did you, again,
• 19:40
  Speaker 4: did you end up doing stage work just because it's what,
• 19:43
  Speaker 4: you know, was the next step?
• 19:46
  Speaker 2: The next step was trying to get work. Yeah. And
• 19:50
  Speaker 2: I got a job at the stage at Delicatessen. Again,
• 19:55
  Speaker 2: I always wanted to put myself where actors were hanging out.
• 19:57
  Speaker 2: And the stage, they were all going there with sandwiches.
• 20:00
  Speaker 2: So I got a job there. And it was the
• 20:03
  Speaker 2: 8th Avenue Grill, I think it was the stage. And
• 20:08
  Speaker 2: later on, One afternoon, there was an actress who was
• 20:13
  Speaker 2: in The Devils. She would come there for lunch, and
• 20:17
  Speaker 2: she was there with her girlfriend. So I kept, I
• 20:20
  Speaker 2: wish I could find her and see her again, because
• 20:22
  Speaker 2: her life is so strange. Her name is Anna Shayla.
• 20:25
  Speaker 2: Maybe she'll read this and come forth where it is.
• 20:29
  Speaker 2: And I said to her, are you an actress? She's beautiful.
• 20:33
  Speaker 2: She's black hair, darker, Italian-looking lady. Are you an actress?
• 20:39
  Speaker 2: She said, oh, yeah. I said, well, are you? What
• 20:41
  Speaker 2: play is it? She said, I'm on Broadway. I said, oh, really?
• 20:43
  Speaker 2: I said to her, what are you doing? She told
• 20:46
  Speaker 2: me the part she was playing, and she was in
• 20:49
  Speaker 2: The Devils. And she told me, but she said to me,
• 20:53
  Speaker 2: there's an audition going on. You'd be right for it.
• 20:57
  Speaker 2: I look up and live. A lamp unto my feet.
• 21:01
  Speaker 2: One of the two. James Earl Jones is going to
• 21:05
  Speaker 2: be in it. And I said, what's it about? She said,
• 21:08
  Speaker 2: it's about an African rebellion, and it would be great
• 21:13
  Speaker 2: to play James Earl Jones's brother. Oh, I got excited
• 21:16
  Speaker 2: for that information. That's the kind of stuff you have
• 21:20
  Speaker 2: to get from people. And I found out where the
• 21:23
  Speaker 2: casting agent was Joyce Selznick. So I called over there,
• 21:28
  Speaker 2: and they said, come over. And I went in there,
• 21:31
  Speaker 2: and we met by the receptionist. Leave a picture. So
• 21:35
  Speaker 2: I looked at the picture, but there was nothing I
• 21:39
  Speaker 2: could put on the back of it. I couldn't make up.
• 21:41
  Speaker 2: I hadn't done anything. So I called back several calls,
• 21:47
  Speaker 2: never got any return calls. And finally they told me,
• 21:51
  Speaker 2: don't come back to the office, because I did that
• 21:53
  Speaker 2: like several times, asking to speak to myself. And they
• 21:56
  Speaker 2: wouldn't let me see her. I said, what do you want?
• 22:00
  Speaker 2: I said, I want to audition. He said, you're not
• 22:03
  Speaker 2: an actor. Who's your agent? Agent? I don't have an agent.
• 22:10
  Speaker 2: So I'm really frustrated. So what do I do? One afternoon,
• 22:17
  Speaker 2: I said, I'm going to call the salesman's office, not
• 22:22
  Speaker 2: as Yaka Koto, but as Marlon Brent on the phone.
• 22:26
  Speaker 2: So I call him up, and I say, I don't
• 22:30
  Speaker 2: want to speak to the salesman. So the woman says,
• 22:34
  Speaker 2: Who is this? Told him Marlon's on the phone. So
• 22:38
  Speaker 2: she comes on the phone, says, this is Marlon. Oh, Marlon,
• 22:41
  Speaker 2: how are you? I said, I got a kid I
• 22:44
  Speaker 2: want you to see. This is Marlon. You know how
• 22:48
  Speaker 2: McCullough's name is. I'm going to take a look at him.
• 22:50
  Speaker 2: This guy's a really good boy. So she said, oh,
• 22:54
  Speaker 2: Marlon McCullough. So I go up to him two days later,
• 22:59
  Speaker 2: and the secretary who had originally called the police to
• 23:02
  Speaker 2: have me removed from the building said, sees me coming again.
• 23:05
  Speaker 2: And she says, I'm going to call the cops if
• 23:07
  Speaker 2: you don't stay out of it. I said, you got
• 23:09
  Speaker 2: the wrong idea. That cop almost threw me in jail.
• 23:12
  Speaker 2: I said, I'm asked to come up here. She says,
• 23:17
  Speaker 2: who asked you? I said, Ms. Selznick. What's your name?
• 23:20
  Speaker 2: I said, Yavacoto. So she calls, Ms. Selznick, Yavacoto's out here. Oh,
• 23:25
  Speaker 2: send them in. So I go in. She says, there
• 23:30
  Speaker 2: are big people who have their eyes on you. And
• 23:33
  Speaker 2: she says to me, She handed me the script. She says,
• 23:36
  Speaker 2: take this and read this script, she says, and get
• 23:39
  Speaker 2: back to me. She says, I'm going to ask you
• 23:40
  Speaker 2: to do a petition. Who is, where are you? I said,
• 23:43
  Speaker 2: the actor. Oh, the actor's studio. That's very strange. No wonder.
• 23:47
  Speaker 2: She said, okay, go ahead. So I take it home.
• 23:50
  Speaker 2: I read it. I come back. And I get the job.
• 23:55
  Speaker 2: All because of Marlon.
• 23:57
  Speaker 4: Again, you created a mystique. Marlon likes this guy.
• 24:01
  Speaker 2: I have to get the damn job. I got it.
• 24:04
  Speaker 2: And I did the thing with James Earl Jones. And
• 24:07
  Speaker 2: I got my after card. And by that time, the
• 24:13
  Speaker 2: after card led to the equity card. That was my
• 24:16
  Speaker 2: first gig. So I rolled up to that.
• 24:22
  Speaker 4: So I guess as you move into film like what
• 24:25
  Speaker 4: do you feel like was the first big movie that
• 24:27
  Speaker 4: you end up on is it like Thomas Crown Affair
• 24:31
  Speaker 4: or one of those like early ones that was a
• 24:32
  Speaker 4: huge production.
• 24:34
  Speaker 2: No it was I think it was Nothing But A
• 24:37
  Speaker 2: Man you know they they won Venice Film Festival I
• 24:47
  Speaker 2: got that I don't know how I got it I
• 24:51
  Speaker 2: was so long without an agent I just, the agents
• 24:54
  Speaker 2: text me, Michael Romer. About this time, I was becoming
• 25:01
  Speaker 2: known as a black brand out in New York. And
• 25:05
  Speaker 2: Michael says, they told me I have to see who
• 25:08
  Speaker 2: they are. And that you want to read the script.
• 25:11
  Speaker 2: So I asked him about the script. And he says,
• 25:14
  Speaker 2: I told him I don't want to read the script.
• 25:15
  Speaker 2: I just want to talk to you. Again, copying what
• 25:19
  Speaker 2: the rebels are, you know, moody and not really, open, suspicious.
• 25:26
  Speaker 2: And I said, I got to go. He said, no,
• 25:28
  Speaker 2: don't leave. He said, I'll walk down with you. And
• 25:32
  Speaker 2: he walked down with the rebel, James E. The rebel
• 25:38
  Speaker 2: doesn't want to do the scrap, and I don't even
• 25:41
  Speaker 2: know why I'm here. That whole game, I was running
• 25:43
  Speaker 2: to the hills. And I got to the place where
• 25:47
  Speaker 2: I was playing it so deeply that I didn't even
• 25:49
  Speaker 2: know I was playing it. I didn't even know it
• 25:51
  Speaker 2: was something I took on. So I take the script and,
• 25:54
  Speaker 2: you know, I did it. And it led to the
• 25:58
  Speaker 2: Thomas Grant affair.
• 26:00
  Speaker 4: That was Norman Jewison. That's pretty huge as far as
• 26:03
  Speaker 4: he was kind of right in the middle of his
• 26:05
  Speaker 4: run and kept getting bigger at that point. What was
• 26:07
  Speaker 4: he like as a director?
• 26:09
  Speaker 2: Great. I mean, he's a funny guy, but absolutely great.
• 26:12
  Speaker 2: And one thing I didn't realize, what was happening, I
• 26:15
  Speaker 2: was getting jobs without having to audition. And people were
• 26:19
  Speaker 2: just picking me. They said, we want you to do this,
• 26:21
  Speaker 2: you know that. I was starting to work and I
• 26:24
  Speaker 2: was getting a reputation as a strange African-American actor, strange guy.
• 26:33
  Speaker 4: Did that come into play as far as trying to
• 26:36
  Speaker 4: work in race as they were casting? Did you feel
• 26:39
  Speaker 4: like that was something you were fighting against in the beginning?
• 26:42
  Speaker 4: Because there's only so many rows, I guess, for things
• 26:45
  Speaker 4: they were casting for black actors at that time.
• 26:47
  Speaker 2: No, I was never looked upon as a black actor.
• 26:51
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 26:51
  Speaker 2: I was looked upon as this strange guy that we
• 26:55
  Speaker 2: wanted in the movie. I didn't even realize this was happening, man.
• 26:59
  Speaker 2: I swear to God, I didn't know it. I've done
• 27:01
  Speaker 2: now 72 movies and something like 110 television appearances. It
• 27:09
  Speaker 2: was always in these strange roles. I've never really been
• 27:13
  Speaker 2: cast as a black actor. Oh, here's this black thing
• 27:16
  Speaker 2: going on. Let's get him. Here's this strange things going on.
• 27:22
  Speaker 2: Like the Liberation of the Lord by Brian Jones, they
• 27:24
  Speaker 2: wanted someone to kill a white man. It was the
• 27:27
  Speaker 2: first time a white man had been killed on the screen.
• 27:30
  Speaker 2: He'd never been seen slapped or hit up to that point.
• 27:33
  Speaker 2: And the Liberation of the Lord by Brian Jones was
• 27:35
  Speaker 2: a turnaround. Because I don't know if you saw that movie,
• 27:39
  Speaker 2: but that movie was strange in the sense that you
• 27:42
  Speaker 2: never had a black man kill a white man on
• 27:44
  Speaker 2: the screen. And the way we killed him, If they
• 27:48
  Speaker 2: had conceived of it as a black man, then they
• 27:51
  Speaker 2: would have the guy cry or pray or do something
• 27:55
  Speaker 2: really typically Negro at the time or do something typically Afro.
• 28:01
  Speaker 2: We did something that no one would do. This guy
• 28:04
  Speaker 2: killed without any remorse, without saying, Mr. Dahl, I'm going
• 28:08
  Speaker 2: to kill your boss. And we didn't want to sound
• 28:12
  Speaker 2: that typical African sound that comes out of Africa. Well,
• 28:17
  Speaker 2: you know that's a black man when you hear him talk.
• 28:20
  Speaker 2: Sonny Boy was dangerous. They didn't know what he was.
• 28:25
  Speaker 2: They didn't know who you are. So when we went
• 28:27
  Speaker 2: to kill him, I didn't go to kill him. You
• 28:31
  Speaker 2: don't know what he was doing there. You saw him
• 28:33
  Speaker 2: standing there behind a tree, a log, of course. And
• 28:37
  Speaker 2: he comes up from behind a log and walks down
• 28:39
  Speaker 2: to the tractor. And he's not threatening at all. He
• 28:42
  Speaker 2: just tells the guy to get down off the tractor.
• 28:45
  Speaker 2: And when he gets down off the tractor, you see
• 28:48
  Speaker 2: this hand that's been standing loosely by the side. There's
• 28:51
  Speaker 2: a gun in it. And he's forgetting that the threshing
• 28:56
  Speaker 2: machine is right back when he pushed him into the
• 28:59
  Speaker 2: threshing machine. And that killed him. And then when they
• 29:02
  Speaker 2: looked at his face, there was nothing on his face
• 29:04
  Speaker 2: at all. Just absolute pure death. And he walked away.
• 29:09
  Speaker 2: And the next time you see him, he's on a train.
• 29:11
  Speaker 2: So you never know what the hell this guy's... What
• 29:15
  Speaker 2: is it? It was completely unusual for an African American
• 29:19
  Speaker 2: to play a part like that. You know, he wasn't
• 29:24
  Speaker 2: being nice, he wasn't being good, he wasn't being soft.
• 29:27
  Speaker 2: He'd just come to kill you, because his friends can
• 29:29
  Speaker 2: kill you. It was a powerful performance. And that thing
• 29:34
  Speaker 2: started a whole genre of black exploitation film.
• 29:41
  Speaker 4: A whole.
• 29:44
  Speaker 2: Genre.
• 29:46
  Speaker 4: It became an industry in itself.
• 29:47
  Speaker 2: It became an industry in itself. Black guys killing white guys.
• 29:52
  Speaker 2: You know, football players killing them. Jim Brown, Brad Williams.
• 29:56
  Speaker 2: It started a whole thing. Good evening. It's intermission time.
• 30:14
  Speaker 3: And during the next 10 minutes, we invite you to
• 30:16
  Speaker 3: visit our refreshment stand, located in the center of the drive-in.
• 30:20
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  Speaker 3: Isaac Hayes is Truck Turner. He's got six deadly pieces
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  Speaker 3: There ain't no Mac here's man enough to ice Truck Turner.
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  Speaker 3: If he gets you, you're cold meat. If you get him,
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• 31:58
  Speaker 1: Hey everyone, this is Jeanette Goldstein and you are listening
• 32:01
  Speaker 1: to Movie Meltdown. Look man, I only need to know
• 32:07
  Speaker 1: one thing.
• 32:09
  Speaker 4: Where they are. I hope that's good. Anytime, anywhere.
• 32:14
  Speaker 2: It's part of your.
• 32:21
  Speaker 4: Problem, you know, you haven't seen enough movies.
• 32:23
  Speaker 2: All of life's riddles are answered in the movies.
• 32:26
  Speaker 3: Now, on with the.
• 32:45
  Speaker 2: Show.
• 32:46
  Speaker 4: I've wondered in years, because I've become interested in all
• 32:48
  Speaker 4: these different versions of exploitation films, and it's like, now
• 32:52
  Speaker 4: we look at it through this window of decades of
• 32:55
  Speaker 4: things changing and, in theory, Hollywood changing, but, like, what
• 33:00
  Speaker 4: it was like at the time to be working on
• 33:02
  Speaker 4: things that were, now would be considered exploitation. Did they
• 33:06
  Speaker 4: feel like that at the time or was it just
• 33:07
  Speaker 4: another job?
• 33:09
  Speaker 2: They felt it was, it became exploitation. Yeah. Because of
• 33:14
  Speaker 2: the people who got associated with it were all, like,
• 33:17
  Speaker 2: football players, models and so forth. You know, Jim Brown,
• 33:21
  Speaker 2: Fred Williamson. Yeah. So it became exploitation. Because that, and
• 33:26
  Speaker 2: nothing but a man, was unusual. And the fact that
• 33:32
  Speaker 2: I wouldn't do any publicity was, again, this is the
• 33:36
  Speaker 2: person I'm talking about. Those things. There's no record of
• 33:39
  Speaker 2: me having any publicity. That was, again, back in my
• 33:42
  Speaker 2: rebel days. I'm not going over the road.
• 33:47
  Speaker 4: Creating that mistake. Well, around that time, one of them
• 33:51
  Speaker 4: I just recently re-watched was Bone, which is another one of, like,
• 33:55
  Speaker 4: just a strange character, and you don't know, like, he
• 33:59
  Speaker 4: just sort of appears, and you don't know what his
• 34:01
  Speaker 4: motives are, and by the end, it really takes a
• 34:03
  Speaker 4: weird turn. But, I don't know, that's a strange, and
• 34:06
  Speaker 4: Larry Cohen being the director, I don't know, what was that?
• 34:09
  Speaker 2: Well, he knew what I, he knew, he knew where
• 34:12
  Speaker 2: I was coming from. He said, you're the strangest person.
• 34:16
  Speaker 4: You've been branded as strange.
• 34:18
  Speaker 2: Strange, yeah, but So he had cast all these black
• 34:22
  Speaker 2: actors prior to casting me, and it wasn't working. He
• 34:26
  Speaker 2: didn't know what it was. He says, I don't know
• 34:29
  Speaker 2: why my old script is not working. I've got all
• 34:32
  Speaker 2: these people. And I met him, and he said, you're crazy.
• 34:39
  Speaker 2: The reason why I'm laughing, because I'm laughing at me then,
• 34:42
  Speaker 2: because I was like being so serious about it. I
• 34:46
  Speaker 2: had mistakenly met these people at the studio And it's
• 34:49
  Speaker 2: taking on the wrong attitude about life.
• 34:54
  Speaker 4: Yeah, most of it doesn't seem motivated as you tell
• 34:56
  Speaker 4: these stories. You were just doing what came naturally, being
• 34:59
  Speaker 4: in that crowd.
• 35:01
  Speaker 2: So when we started playing that role, he was happy
• 35:04
  Speaker 2: because this is what I wanted. Finally, strange. This weird
• 35:09
  Speaker 2: guy who comes and rapes this white chick. And, you know,
• 35:14
  Speaker 2: people forgot it was a black man raping, you know,
• 35:17
  Speaker 2: going after this white woman. And it became bizarre, more
• 35:21
  Speaker 2: and more bizarre of his behavior was just, even the
• 35:25
  Speaker 2: way he moved. He moved like some kind of a cat,
• 35:30
  Speaker 2: you know. And it worked. You couldn't put your finger
• 35:33
  Speaker 2: on it. Again, it just worked.
• 35:37
  Speaker 4: It's really interesting, and that's kind of why I like
• 35:39
  Speaker 4: watching those exploitation movies that fall into that kind of stuff,
• 35:43
  Speaker 4: because sometimes they pinpoint things that were going on in
• 35:46
  Speaker 4: society that you can't get now. It's a very specific
• 35:50
  Speaker 4: window into.
• 35:51
  Speaker 2: What was going on. And the cameraman who filmed Marlon
• 35:54
  Speaker 2: Brando and James Dean in Montgomery Clift, they were able
• 35:59
  Speaker 2: to see that strangeness with these people. and catch these
• 36:03
  Speaker 2: strange moods that they were able to get in that
• 36:06
  Speaker 2: they didn't even need to say anything. Even when Marlon
• 36:09
  Speaker 2: Bradley's back was turned, and you just looked at him,
• 36:11
  Speaker 2: you knew that some weird shit was going to come
• 36:14
  Speaker 2: from him that you didn't expect. And so you're constantly looking.
• 36:19
  Speaker 2: That's what came out of the studio. That's what came
• 36:22
  Speaker 2: out of the studio. That's what you see when you
• 36:25
  Speaker 2: see people like Montgomery Clips on the screen. You don't
• 36:28
  Speaker 2: know where they're coming from. That was the system they
• 36:32
  Speaker 2: acted in. and, you know, romantic.
• 36:34
  Speaker 4: Well, and then you, again, I guess through the strange persona,
• 36:39
  Speaker 4: go into these different types of roles. I guess one
• 36:41
  Speaker 4: of the most high profile at the time would be
• 36:44
  Speaker 4: like becoming a Bond villain, which then you ended up doing.
• 36:47
  Speaker 4: So that's, again, I think was the first black actor
• 36:50
  Speaker 4: to be a big main villain in one of those movies.
• 36:53
  Speaker 4: And then it definitely, that's a different style in most
• 36:56
  Speaker 4: of the Bond movies. So I don't know, what was
• 36:57
  Speaker 4: it like being thrown into that huge.
• 37:00
  Speaker 2: For the same very reasons. I'll do it across the
• 37:04
  Speaker 2: 110th Street with the great Anthony Quinn, the Lord of
• 37:07
  Speaker 2: All Flies, or God on Earth, as he told me
• 37:10
  Speaker 2: he was. And Arthur Picker from United Artists, the executive,
• 37:16
  Speaker 2: walked up on the street and said, they want you
• 37:18
  Speaker 2: to do Bond. I didn't even know who he was.
• 37:20
  Speaker 2: So he says, we want you to do this James
• 37:23
  Speaker 2: Bond movie. So I said, who? I didn't have an agent.
• 37:28
  Speaker 2: at the time, again with the Rebels.
• 37:30
  Speaker 4: This is years into your career, still no agent.
• 37:32
  Speaker 2: Still no agent. And he says, would you play James Bond?
• 37:38
  Speaker 2: I said, okay. So I was going from one movie
• 37:40
  Speaker 2: to another one, cast on the street, even before I
• 37:43
  Speaker 2: got through with the other movie. So I said, okay,
• 37:46
  Speaker 2: I'll do it. And he said, send you a script.
• 37:50
  Speaker 2: I said, I don't need to see the script. I'm
• 37:51
  Speaker 2: going to do a James Bond movie, whatever I read for.
• 37:53
  Speaker 2: He laughed. And I meant it. I'm going to read it.
• 37:56
  Speaker 2: I'm going to read it. I read all the play
• 37:59
  Speaker 2: in English. And the character worked. Ken Anger and Mr. Big,
• 38:06
  Speaker 2: it worked. It absolutely worked. It worked. By that time
• 38:12
  Speaker 2: I had become so established that the work was coming.
• 38:18
  Speaker 2: Work that I didn't really say, I'm going to work.
• 38:20
  Speaker 2: It was coming because of my attitude, I think.
• 38:23
  Speaker 6: Have you ever had an agent? Did you ever get
• 38:25
  Speaker 6: to a place where.
• 38:25
  Speaker 2: I had an agent for a very short period and
• 38:27
  Speaker 2: it ended But most of the work that I've gotten
• 38:31
  Speaker 2: just came. That's amazing. No, I didn't need it. As
• 38:35
  Speaker 2: a result, I didn't do any publicity with what I did.
• 38:39
  Speaker 2: Mostly because some of the actresses there, Barbara Stanwyck and
• 38:46
  Speaker 2: Judy Holliday, they told me don't do any publicity. You know,
• 38:51
  Speaker 2: stay away. So most of these things I'm talking about,
• 38:54
  Speaker 2: I've done some interviews during the pictures, but I haven't
• 38:56
  Speaker 2: gone out. on a full campaign, here's who I am,
• 38:59
  Speaker 2: and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. You know, what the
• 39:02
  Speaker 2: hell for? I'm working, what do I need to, you know?
• 39:07
  Speaker 4: You almost created your own type, where they'd be like,
• 39:09
  Speaker 4: we need a Yafit Kodo type.
• 39:10
  Speaker 2: That's what happened?
• 39:11
  Speaker 4: Yeah, it became you.
• 39:13
  Speaker 2: After homicide, I looked at him, and I said, what
• 39:15
  Speaker 2: the hell is going on here? Wearing my clothes, you know, like,
• 39:22
  Speaker 2: something like me, and, I swear, I see it every time.
• 39:27
  Speaker 2: I see it today. Not only that, reading Yaka Kono movies. Yeah.
• 39:32
  Speaker 2: Across the hundred and tenth street. Just remaking them. Saying
• 39:36
  Speaker 2: old things. These guys are absolutely weird, man. It's weird.
• 39:42
  Speaker 2: It's got to be.
• 39:43
  Speaker 4: It's real.
• 39:44
  Speaker 2: But, notice, the NAACP doesn't recognize Mike, correct? They don't
• 39:51
  Speaker 2: give me awards. They don't say, oh, you got to cover.
• 39:55
  Speaker 2: No one. They don't. No one. No Academy Awards, no Emmys,
• 40:00
  Speaker 2: no anything. Yes, they say, oh, I was a great actor,
• 40:03
  Speaker 2: but I don't get any acknowledgments from the black establishment.
• 40:12
  Speaker 4: Because you did it so seamlessly. Yeah, it seemed like,
• 40:15
  Speaker 4: like you said, it wasn't being... put out there as
• 40:18
  Speaker 4: like it's a black role. You just created these characters.
• 40:21
  Speaker 2: As you went along. No, no acknowledgement.
• 40:24
  Speaker 6: Do you have a personal theory as to why that.
• 40:29
  Speaker 2: Is? I think a director told me he went to
• 40:34
  Speaker 2: a producer in Hollywood with this black picture and the
• 40:38
  Speaker 2: producer said, yeah, it's not black. And the black actor
• 40:42
  Speaker 2: got upset. The director got upset and told me that's
• 40:45
  Speaker 2: what it was told him. Fox or Paramount or something
• 40:47
  Speaker 2: like that. Uh, I don't know why they said that. Um,
• 40:51
  Speaker 2: I just don't, don't get, I will never get, nor
• 40:56
  Speaker 2: do I want any, um, uh, uh, acknowledgments from the
• 41:04
  Speaker 2: NAACP and the image award. I don't care. This career
• 41:10
  Speaker 2: has opened the door for practically every actor that's working. Yeah. And,
• 41:16
  Speaker 2: The fact that they'll pull this racist shit on me
• 41:19
  Speaker 2: shows they got a problem. And two or three of them,
• 41:23
  Speaker 2: representatives years ago, wanted me to come. And I said,
• 41:27
  Speaker 2: I'm not coming because it's a Jewish holiday and I
• 41:29
  Speaker 2: won't fly. I think it's because I'm Jewish. I've been so.
• 41:37
  Speaker 2: And I think it's because I'm conservative. Republicans have always been.
• 41:42
  Speaker 2: A little bit further with the Democratic Party, but my
• 41:44
  Speaker 2: ideas have always been conservative. And so people like me,
• 41:48
  Speaker 2: I've always been out. Even though I walked the streets
• 41:52
  Speaker 2: with Dr. King, even though I was a leader that
• 41:55
  Speaker 2: helped in the Congress of Racial Equality, my political ideas
• 41:59
  Speaker 2: and their beliefs are contrary. And so if you're a
• 42:03
  Speaker 2: Republican and you're a compassionate Republican, it's not enough. It's
• 42:13
  Speaker 2: just not enough. They want you to do the thing
• 42:15
  Speaker 2: with the marching and so forth, carrying on. I've never
• 42:21
  Speaker 2: believed in that. Never believed in that. Until we change,
• 42:27
  Speaker 2: nothing's going to change. That atmosphere, man. And there's a
• 42:31
  Speaker 2: lot of black conservatives out there who are basketball players,
• 42:34
  Speaker 2: football players, stars, and they're all right. But are afraid
• 42:38
  Speaker 2: to say they are because they're going to be condemned
• 42:42
  Speaker 2: by certain people on the other side of things.
• 42:47
  Speaker 4: Interesting oh at some point I knew we were going
• 42:50
  Speaker 4: to have to definitely talk about Alien that's that's such
• 42:53
  Speaker 4: a huge point in your career and then just a
• 42:56
  Speaker 4: movie that sort of changed that genre what I thought
• 43:00
  Speaker 4: was always so.
• 43:00
  Speaker 2: Interesting three movies changed the genre at that time the
• 43:03
  Speaker 2: Liberation of Lloyd Byron Jones made people understand that black
• 43:06
  Speaker 2: men weren't weak and scared of singing for nuns running
• 43:09
  Speaker 2: down the street yeah okay um the second movie that
• 43:14
  Speaker 2: changed everything was live and let die.
• 43:17
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 43:17
  Speaker 2: They suddenly said, black guys could be these villains to
• 43:20
  Speaker 2: come after us. Okay. And then the third movie that
• 43:23
  Speaker 2: put blacks in space and in adventures was, uh, alien. Yeah.
• 43:29
  Speaker 2: So then the whole industry opened up. You think you say,
• 43:32
  Speaker 2: Oh my God, you know, fantastic job. He did exactly what,
• 43:37
  Speaker 2: what we've been trying to do, you know, uh, through
• 43:42
  Speaker 2: picketing and carrying on. And so we're all working now. Well,
• 43:47
  Speaker 2: fuck it, we're not going to give them the fucking NWCP.
• 43:53
  Speaker 2: We're not going to give them the goddamn NWCP Image Award,
• 43:57
  Speaker 2: even though he started the, I put all these black
• 43:59
  Speaker 2: women behind cameras. I spent money to send black women
• 44:02
  Speaker 2: to school to learn and become script supervisors. Do I
• 44:06
  Speaker 2: get any thanks for that? Absolutely not. Screw them. I
• 44:11
  Speaker 2: helped them. I helped all the stunts that were done
• 44:15
  Speaker 2: in Living Let Die. I brought the Black Stuntsman Union
• 44:20
  Speaker 2: to do that movie. It was me behind the scenes.
• 44:25
  Speaker 2: The movie I did for, what was it called? Drum?
• 44:30
  Speaker 2: I brought black actors into that. I constantly helped open
• 44:35
  Speaker 2: the Watts Writers Workshop where black writers were at, Bud
• 44:40
  Speaker 2: Schoenberg and I, Dozens of writers got published. We brought
• 44:45
  Speaker 2: in Jackie Kennedy, who published a lot of these people.
• 44:48
  Speaker 2: Done all these things, man. Black you better get a market.
• 44:56
  Speaker 4: Always have to do things differently. That throws them off. But, yeah,
• 45:03
  Speaker 4: I mean, that's kind of what I thought was interesting.
• 45:06
  Speaker 2: If I became a Democrat, oh, yeah, oh.
• 45:09
  Speaker 3: Oh, yeah, that.
• 45:10
  Speaker 2: Oh, the greatest. that conservative thing over my head which
• 45:15
  Speaker 2: is proven to be a.
• 45:16
  Speaker 4: Rope well i mean that's i didn't uh with the
• 45:20
  Speaker 4: fridley scott like i feel like that's one of the
• 45:22
  Speaker 4: things that changed because like lucas did that like everything's
• 45:25
  Speaker 4: kind of grimy in space and very lived in but
• 45:27
  Speaker 4: but in alien we also have this like working class
• 45:31
  Speaker 4: that like you never really saw like in star wars
• 45:33
  Speaker 4: everybody's like a superhero you know they're still dressed flashy
• 45:36
  Speaker 4: and they're bounty hunters but like When you guys get
• 45:38
  Speaker 4: in Alien, it's like these are like an oil rig
• 45:41
  Speaker 4: in space. You guys are just working class. Everybody on
• 45:44
  Speaker 4: there is just like, this is their job, and they're
• 45:47
  Speaker 4: kind of sick of it. There's no flash to the space.
• 45:50
  Speaker 6: Worried about the bonus situation?
• 45:52
  Speaker 4: Yeah, where's my bonus at? I don't know. I thought
• 45:55
  Speaker 4: that was always a really interesting take on it. Plus,
• 45:58
  Speaker 4: it's the most working class you and Harry Dean Stan.
• 46:02
  Speaker 4: Do you want to work in the Harry Dean angle here?
• 46:03
  Speaker 2: Sure.
• 46:04
  Speaker 1: He's pointing to me with Harry Dean Stanton because I
• 46:06
  Speaker 1: started a festival.
• 46:08
  Speaker 6: Harry Dean's from Kentucky, so.
• 46:09
  Speaker 1: Indiana has James Dean and Mario Brando, and Kentucky has
• 46:13
  Speaker 1: Harry Dean Stanton and Mario Notes.
• 46:15
  Speaker 6: So I started a festival for him about five years ago.
• 46:18
  Speaker 2: Oh, wow.
• 46:19
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and we do it annually. We show his films.
• 46:21
  Speaker 1: We bring in guests to speak. So you're invited any
• 46:23
  Speaker 1: time you want to come. We would love to have you.
• 46:25
  Speaker 2: Thank you.
• 46:26
  Speaker 6: But I love.
• 46:27
  Speaker 1: you and him together. He has more on-screen chemistry with
• 46:31
  Speaker 1: you than I think anybody I've ever seen him in
• 46:33
  Speaker 1: a film with. There's something just so loose and free
• 46:37
  Speaker 1: and joyful at times.
• 46:38
  Speaker 4: Which is unusual for Harry.
• 46:40
  Speaker 6: Uncharacteristic. Just in your presence.
• 46:42
  Speaker 1: I'm just wondering about that relationship.
• 46:45
  Speaker 2: Harry's what they call method actor. He's close friend of
• 46:51
  Speaker 2: Marlon and James Dean. He was coming from the same
• 46:56
  Speaker 2: place we both have the same philosophy of our life,
• 46:59
  Speaker 2: you know, so it was like we weren't acting, we
• 47:03
  Speaker 2: were actually saying, yeah, this is the truth of what's happening,
• 47:07
  Speaker 2: you know, and so our relationship worked because it's, our
• 47:13
  Speaker 2: philosophy has been the same since we started acting. We
• 47:17
  Speaker 2: don't care.
• 47:18
  Speaker 4: You know. It's definitely his thing.
• 47:20
  Speaker 2: That's the whole point of the whole thing, you know.
• 47:23
  Speaker 2: That's why it worked, you know. We weren't looking for
• 47:26
  Speaker 2: it to work. We were just looking to, yeah, this
• 47:29
  Speaker 2: is what's going on. We're eyeing this thing. We've got
• 47:32
  Speaker 2: to make the best of it.
• 47:33
  Speaker 6: Yeah, you can feel that. It's palpable on the screen.
• 47:36
  Speaker 4: These are two buddies.
• 47:37
  Speaker 2: Yep. It's like when I met him, I knew we
• 47:41
  Speaker 2: were both coming from the same place. And so we
• 47:44
  Speaker 2: communicated in a way that we would communicate. He walked
• 47:49
  Speaker 2: into this room. It was not a different scene at all.
• 47:52
  Speaker 4: Well, that had such a different visual style. Was all
• 47:55
  Speaker 4: that sort of in place when you got involved in
• 47:58
  Speaker 4: it as far as the design of the creature, design
• 48:00
  Speaker 4: of the craft and the spaceship?
• 48:02
  Speaker 2: I really didn't get into it. I really didn't care
• 48:04
  Speaker 2: about the goddamn spaceship. What was happening with them. You know,
• 48:09
  Speaker 2: they were doing their thing, running around the set. I
• 48:12
  Speaker 2: was just laughing at them. All the busy, they were busy.
• 48:15
  Speaker 2: Got a lot of work to do. These guys are nuts, man.
• 48:22
  Speaker 2: This job you're doing is not any different than what
• 48:25
  Speaker 2: other people are doing. You know, the cab drivers and
• 48:29
  Speaker 2: truck drivers and engineers, they're all doing the same thing.
• 48:33
  Speaker 2: But somehow Hollywood people start feeling special about what we do.
• 48:38
  Speaker 2: You know, it's just a movie, man. You know what
• 48:41
  Speaker 2: I'm saying? This is sort of go into the theater,
• 48:44
  Speaker 2: pay the popcorn, sit down, go home. What we're doing
• 48:47
  Speaker 2: is not important. There are things that, you know, people
• 48:50
  Speaker 2: being operated on, heart surgery. Life and death. Life and death.
• 48:54
  Speaker 2: That's important. So finally I met someone who understood that
• 48:58
  Speaker 2: this is bullshit. Everybody's here for the dough, let's face it,
• 49:04
  Speaker 2: you know.
• 49:05
  Speaker 4: He really is tapped into Harry Dean's mentality.
• 49:08
  Speaker 2: That's what they're there for, man. That's what everyone's working for,
• 49:10
  Speaker 2: to get that money, you know. Except maybe women, not
• 49:14
  Speaker 2: the master race, the women. Yeah. Stronger than we are.
• 49:21
  Speaker 2: So therefore, Veronica and Ripley Sigourney were they were the
• 49:35
  Speaker 2: real strength of the movement. As is, as my philosophy,
• 49:40
  Speaker 2: women are 10,000 times stronger than we are mentally and
• 49:44
  Speaker 2: physically and spiritually. It can take a whole lot. So
• 49:48
  Speaker 2: the position that Ripley had was perfect. Yeah.
• 49:50
  Speaker 4: Well, that, again, why that movie's so game-changing, because they
• 49:55
  Speaker 4: never established that Ripley was a female character. It was
• 49:58
  Speaker 4: just written as Ripley. And then finally, like, they were
• 50:01
  Speaker 4: signing the deal, and, like, the production company called him
• 50:04
  Speaker 4: back and was like, one question, is Ripley a man
• 50:06
  Speaker 4: or a woman?
• 50:07
  Speaker 2: And they just, uh, woman?
• 50:09
  Speaker 4: Like, it wasn't written as a female role.
• 50:12
  Speaker 2: No, it wasn't in the first script. Yeah. But as
• 50:15
  Speaker 2: they changed it, they wanted it to be a female.
• 50:19
  Speaker 2: And they wanted someone else. I won't mention who that
• 50:21
  Speaker 2: person is. But the second group, from the first script,
• 50:26
  Speaker 2: it was written for anyone. But then as they changed it,
• 50:30
  Speaker 2: they said, we want a woman in this. And it
• 50:33
  Speaker 2: had to be a female. Like, Parker had to be
• 50:38
  Speaker 2: this dominating spirit. Uh, it had to be. It was
• 50:43
  Speaker 2: time for, it was time that change. If you're going
• 50:48
  Speaker 2: to have a monster and a monster has to be slain,
• 50:54
  Speaker 2: you have to go away from Adolf Tuxley's beliefs and
• 50:58
  Speaker 2: all other beliefs and, and have it slain by a woman.
• 51:01
  Speaker 2: You know, so this author, King Arthur becomes, uh, Queen
• 51:09
  Speaker 2: Anne to slay the dragon. That's what makes that thing
• 51:13
  Speaker 2: so powerful. That the role of the hero has changed.
• 51:19
  Speaker 2: The hero throughout all of our classical history has always
• 51:23
  Speaker 2: been the reluctant man who doesn't want to go into,
• 51:26
  Speaker 2: doesn't want the adventure, doesn't want to call to the adventure,
• 51:28
  Speaker 2: doesn't want to descend into the belly of the beast
• 51:32
  Speaker 2: as Joseph Campbell puts it, to become, it's never been
• 51:35
  Speaker 2: the female. When you look back at heroes, In history,
• 51:39
  Speaker 2: it has always been the female. It wasn't Jesus that
• 51:42
  Speaker 2: was the history. It was the hero. It was Mary
• 51:46
  Speaker 2: who was the hero. It was his mother who was
• 51:49
  Speaker 2: the hero. But they mess with her history in such
• 51:51
  Speaker 2: a way. They don't put into the screen that she
• 51:54
  Speaker 2: was a hairdresser. They don't put into history that she
• 51:57
  Speaker 2: had two children on the desert. They don't put into
• 52:00
  Speaker 2: history that she was a friend of Augustus. They don't
• 52:06
  Speaker 2: put into history that she saved their life by moving
• 52:09
  Speaker 2: her out in Jerusalem and letting them put this history,
• 52:14
  Speaker 2: letting Rome protect her two sons. They don't put anything
• 52:18
  Speaker 2: about her in there. They remove it all and say
• 52:21
  Speaker 2: she just had a kid and he grew up to
• 52:23
  Speaker 2: be the hero. She was a gift. It was a gift.
• 52:27
  Speaker 4: It's storytelling and how it's changed a little.
• 52:31
  Speaker 2: Bit over the years. They desperately want to do it.
• 52:35
  Speaker 2: And they don't do it because of storytelling. They do
• 52:38
  Speaker 2: it on every single level of our society. They do
• 52:41
  Speaker 2: it in college. They do it in grade school. They
• 52:45
  Speaker 2: do it in the streets. They do it in cinemas.
• 52:47
  Speaker 2: They do it in books. Bring the woman down to
• 52:50
  Speaker 2: the place where she's just a vessel and prop ourselves
• 52:53
  Speaker 2: up as the guardians of the earth. And it's never
• 52:57
  Speaker 2: been that way. If you go back and look at
• 53:00
  Speaker 2: history and what happened, a woman always came in and
• 53:04
  Speaker 2: changed the entire, what, France? John the Rock? The black movement?
• 53:14
  Speaker 2: Nothing happened until Rosa Parks decided not to get up
• 53:18
  Speaker 2: and go to the back of it. And then it
• 53:20
  Speaker 2: all happened. You trace history, there's always a woman there
• 53:22
  Speaker 2: who comes, who is the strength. You know, you have
• 53:25
  Speaker 2: that going on now, in my opinion. Oh, she says,
• 53:31
  Speaker 2: I'm not going to give them America. And the Americans
• 53:36
  Speaker 2: were there because they were saying, well, the Constitution says
• 53:40
  Speaker 2: you have to do it. Well, let's examine it. What
• 53:44
  Speaker 2: did we do after the Second World War when we
• 53:50
  Speaker 2: brought the Nazis to trial? They said we were only
• 53:55
  Speaker 2: following the Constitution that Hitler had put down. He says,
• 54:00
  Speaker 2: why didn't you have the moral authority to say, no,
• 54:04
  Speaker 2: I'm not going to put those Jews in. I was
• 54:07
  Speaker 2: only following the law. We didn't want to hear that.
• 54:09
  Speaker 2: You should have followed your conscience. It was all right
• 54:12
  Speaker 2: to say that then, but it's not all right to
• 54:15
  Speaker 2: say that now. So the conscientious objector who says, I
• 54:19
  Speaker 2: won't give these people a license to get married, is
• 54:21
  Speaker 2: he now the criminal? Then you shouldn't have created the
• 54:25
  Speaker 2: two words conscientious objector. You should have left that out
• 54:29
  Speaker 2: of the open. lexicon because now our education system is
• 54:34
  Speaker 2: contradicting itself.
• 54:39
  Speaker 4: I was trying to get some of the other roles.
• 54:42
  Speaker 4: The one that to me I think almost branded you
• 54:45
  Speaker 4: in that new wave of career when you had the
• 54:48
  Speaker 4: new Yafet Koto type was Midnight Run. I feel like
• 54:52
  Speaker 4: he's such an identifiable, the guy in the trench coat,
• 54:55
  Speaker 4: the guy that's in charge of everybody but still like
• 54:59
  Speaker 4: I don't know. It became such a great role in
• 55:01
  Speaker 4: that movie. We were just talking about it recently on
• 55:03
  Speaker 4: the show.
• 55:05
  Speaker 2: And again, you can't identify Mosley with any race. His
• 55:10
  Speaker 2: frustration with people messing with him just reached a place
• 55:15
  Speaker 2: where as soon as you see him, you know he's
• 55:18
  Speaker 2: not laughing. He's not laughing, but you're laughing because you
• 55:22
  Speaker 2: know there is something about him that is completely insane.
• 55:29
  Speaker 4: And yet he's still trying to come down with some
• 55:31
  Speaker 4: sort of order to this. And you've got your other
• 55:33
  Speaker 4: characters creating chaos at all times.
• 55:35
  Speaker 2: We can see his insecurity. Each time he shows up,
• 55:41
  Speaker 2: there are more guys. First time you see him, it's
• 55:44
  Speaker 2: two guys. The next ten. Twenty. Then whole armies and helicopters.
• 55:51
  Speaker 2: People say, there's something going on here that's not right.
• 55:54
  Speaker 2: He's the one calling for all this backup and help.
• 55:57
  Speaker 2: You know, so he becomes something bizarre.
• 56:03
  Speaker 4: We were talking about how, what a weird, like, track
• 56:06
  Speaker 4: record Martin Brest had as well. What was he like
• 56:08
  Speaker 4: shooting that film as a director?
• 56:10
  Speaker 2: Marty's a really strange man.
• 56:12
  Speaker 4: He's got a strange bunch of movies.
• 56:15
  Speaker 2: I mean, I'm kind of, like, used to working with
• 56:17
  Speaker 2: strange people who have these strange projects that get made. So, like,
• 56:21
  Speaker 2: a whole lifetime. He comes to me, he says, Yeah,
• 56:25
  Speaker 2: I want you to know something. When I'm doing a movie,
• 56:28
  Speaker 2: I really get into it. I said, okay, Marty, I
• 56:30
  Speaker 2: understand that. He said, I stopped eating. And I stopped sleeping.
• 56:35
  Speaker 2: And I'm going to change. He said, don't let it
• 56:38
  Speaker 2: frighten you. So all the period of time that we
• 56:40
  Speaker 2: shot that movie, Marty had stopped eating. He stopped sleeping.
• 56:45
  Speaker 2: He stopped everything. And so... a ghost would appear who
• 56:49
  Speaker 2: looked like he had just stepped out of Dachau or
• 56:51
  Speaker 2: Mauthausen behind the camera. He was behind the camera looking
• 56:54
  Speaker 2: really gaunt, skinny, dark shadows. So it was hard to concentrate.
• 57:02
  Speaker 2: I couldn't look at Marty's direction. It just went off.
• 57:07
  Speaker 2: The whole drama was going on behind the camera with him.
• 57:13
  Speaker 2: But we knew it was good because For me, it
• 57:15
  Speaker 2: was good because I need those kind of odd things
• 57:18
  Speaker 2: that bring out the oddity in Mosley, who was weird.
• 57:25
  Speaker 4: It's just so funny to watch him with the other, yeah,
• 57:28
  Speaker 4: him trying to maintain some sense in order to it.
• 57:31
  Speaker 2: No one knows why they laugh when they see him.
• 57:35
  Speaker 2: But people start laughing immediately when they see him. Because
• 57:39
  Speaker 2: he got it. These guys were messing with him, you
• 57:41
  Speaker 2: know what I'm saying?
• 57:43
  Speaker 4: But I feel like it creates that archetype that then
• 57:46
  Speaker 4: becomes like a lot of your roles later start to
• 57:48
  Speaker 4: echo that. And you see in like Two by Sea
• 57:51
  Speaker 4: of all movies, it feels like he's coming back. And
• 57:54
  Speaker 4: then definitely Homicide, it feels like you get a little
• 57:56
  Speaker 4: piece of him in those characters.
• 57:59
  Speaker 2: Yeah, you get a little bit of the oddness there
• 58:03
  Speaker 2: and the fact that he speaks Italian.
• 58:08
  Speaker 4: Homicide was a great, yeah, was that something that came
• 58:11
  Speaker 4: to you?
• 58:12
  Speaker 2: I had just moved into this house in Conifer, and
• 58:20
  Speaker 2: I had no agent. In my house, I have horses
• 58:27
  Speaker 2: and everything. I'm sitting on the porch, and I hear
• 58:29
  Speaker 2: this car coming up the hill, and it's rising smoke
• 58:33
  Speaker 2: behind it. It's Barry Leveson. He says, we want you
• 58:38
  Speaker 2: to do this. fucking come out and ask me to
• 58:43
  Speaker 2: do this shit.
• 58:45
  Speaker 4: He's also got a mystique then.
• 58:47
  Speaker 2: He does things a little differently. So I said, what
• 58:52
  Speaker 2: it's about? So he tells me. Let me just figure
• 58:56
  Speaker 2: it out, okay? I get invited to New York City
• 59:03
  Speaker 2: by NBC. I mean, the hot shots. What an want
• 59:10
  Speaker 2: with me? I go there, and as I'm going there,
• 59:14
  Speaker 2: I stop and get a newspaper, and I read that
• 59:16
  Speaker 2: I'm doing a television show. I swear to God, I
• 59:19
  Speaker 2: didn't say I was going to do a television show.
• 59:23
  Speaker 2: That's what happened. I left, did the big party.
• 59:26
  Speaker 4: All the outfit.
• 59:27
  Speaker 2: It just... Oh, we're so glad you're doing a fucking homicide. Wow.
• 59:36
  Speaker 2: I'm going to say no. Warren Littlefield, he's standing there.
• 59:38
  Speaker 2: He's the president of fucking NBC. Standing next to him
• 59:41
  Speaker 2: is the head of GE. So both of them are
• 59:45
  Speaker 2: standing there. I reckon that's where they are. These are
• 59:48
  Speaker 2: high-catching directors. These are like those. Industry giants. Jesus Christ.
• 59:57
  Speaker 2: So I call up a guy I know. He works
• 59:58
  Speaker 2: for a metropolitan agency. You know him. He said, why
• 1:00:03
  Speaker 2: can't I help you, man? What am I going to
• 1:00:05
  Speaker 2: tell those guys that go, you're not going to do it?
• 1:00:08
  Speaker 2: So I said, okay, I'll do it. I had no choice,
• 1:00:11
  Speaker 2: you know, in the matter. I think I called Jesse
• 1:00:15
  Speaker 2: Jackson to get his advice. I said, fuck it, I'll
• 1:00:19
  Speaker 2: do it. And then finally, I went to him and said,
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 2: you know what? I'll do it if you let me write.
• 1:00:25
  Speaker 2: And he said, okay. Then I got excited. I said,
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 2: at least I can write. I got something out of it.
• 1:00:29
  Speaker 2: I didn't even know how much I was being paid,
• 1:00:31
  Speaker 2: you know? I didn't tell you. How do you say
• 1:00:34
  Speaker 2: no to NBC? People call you. You're in it. You're
• 1:00:38
  Speaker 2: in the opposite. Hey, I'm going to come right in.
• 1:00:41
  Speaker 2: I said, oh, yeah. Are you going to do this? Oh, yeah.
• 1:00:44
  Speaker 2: I'm doing Homicide.
• 1:00:46
  Speaker 4: Luckily, it turned out to be good because I feel
• 1:00:49
  Speaker 4: like that's that turning point. And it's funny that it
• 1:00:52
  Speaker 4: was network television, but it was one of the first
• 1:00:54
  Speaker 4: things that felt like it was bringing– filmmaking into a
• 1:00:58
  Speaker 4: television format, you know, which you get later with Sopranos
• 1:01:01
  Speaker 4: and stuff.
• 1:01:01
  Speaker 2: It was going to get weird. I knew it was
• 1:01:03
  Speaker 2: going to get weird. It was going to get weird.
• 1:01:05
  Speaker 2: When Barry came and told me how it all, I
• 1:01:08
  Speaker 2: knew it was going to get weird, but the cameras
• 1:01:10
  Speaker 2: would not stop moving. You know, the camera kept circling
• 1:01:14
  Speaker 2: and doing, people got weird and sick, you know, so again,
• 1:01:20
  Speaker 2: my weirdness sort of was catching on to Barry. You
• 1:01:25
  Speaker 2: shot it completely different.
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 4: It's stuff you see in TV now, but at the
• 1:01:28
  Speaker 4: time you really didn't see stuff like that.
• 1:01:30
  Speaker 2: No, not at all. They're all copying us now. The
• 1:01:34
  Speaker 2: way they edit and the way they cut. But they
• 1:01:37
  Speaker 2: asked us to back up on the editing because it
• 1:01:39
  Speaker 2: was making viewers dizzy. So watching it, people were feeling
• 1:01:43
  Speaker 2: weird watching the show. It took some time to get
• 1:01:48
  Speaker 2: used to the camera constantly moving. Never stopping. Stopping what
• 1:01:52
  Speaker 2: you were doing and then coming back and getting it. Me,
• 1:01:55
  Speaker 2: I didn't care because, you know, I was just being,
• 1:01:58
  Speaker 2: just go through my existence, man. You know, whatever I'm doing,
• 1:02:01
  Speaker 2: you know, you get it. It's cool. But a lot
• 1:02:03
  Speaker 2: of the actors were thrown off and had to go
• 1:02:06
  Speaker 2: back and make up their mind and concentrate real hard. Oh, okay.
• 1:02:09
  Speaker 2: You know, they were getting into it, you know. I
• 1:02:13
  Speaker 2: was in my space, man, so I didn't care what
• 1:02:15
  Speaker 2: he did with their camera.
• 1:02:16
  Speaker 4: You'd done so much film work. Yeah, probably was it.
• 1:02:18
  Speaker 4: But anybody used to TV. Like, they're so locked down
• 1:02:21
  Speaker 4: in those shows before then.
• 1:02:22
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, that's exactly right. Film work and my
• 1:02:27
  Speaker 2: attitude helped me get through that one. I'm glad it's over, man.
• 1:02:30
  Speaker 2: Nine years. I left the country after that.
• 1:02:34
  Speaker 4: It had such a great cast, though. I moved out of.
• 1:02:36
  Speaker 2: The United States after that. I went to the Philippines.
• 1:02:40
  Speaker 2: I lived in Canada. I still haven't come back, really.
• 1:02:43
  Speaker 2: I don't live in the United States anymore.
• 1:02:45
  Speaker 4: Was it just the schedule? What made you want to
• 1:02:49
  Speaker 4: get away from it?
• 1:02:50
  Speaker 2: It's too much, man. I mean, It's just, all of
• 1:02:53
  Speaker 2: it's too much. The news, boo, boop, boop, boop, boop.
• 1:02:57
  Speaker 2: I want it somewhere else, man. You know, a country
• 1:02:59
  Speaker 2: where people are really looking at you and talking to
• 1:03:01
  Speaker 2: each other. And the Philippines provided that for me. And, no,
• 1:03:04
  Speaker 2: first I went to Canada. I was up there in Canada.
• 1:03:07
  Speaker 2: I got a piece of property way out at the
• 1:03:09
  Speaker 2: end of Canada, probably Marmar. You know, across the street
• 1:03:14
  Speaker 2: from me, people were seeing, like, the Virgin Mary. Thousands
• 1:03:17
  Speaker 2: of people were coming. You know, and then I went
• 1:03:19
  Speaker 2: to the Philippines. I still haven't come back. to the
• 1:03:23
  Speaker 2: United States, man. I want to see, I want to
• 1:03:26
  Speaker 2: know that the dialogue in this country is changing, people
• 1:03:30
  Speaker 2: are changing, people are looking and listening, you know, but
• 1:03:34
  Speaker 2: they're not saying all kinds of war talk. Fuck these
• 1:03:39
  Speaker 2: guys out. A lot of shit going on, man. It's
• 1:03:43
  Speaker 2: too heavy. I can't... The artist.
• 1:03:53
  Speaker 2: Is going to say something one day. I mean, an
• 1:03:55
  Speaker 2: artist is going to say something about it. It's not
• 1:03:59
  Speaker 2: like we don't know what's happening. I'm going to do it,
• 1:04:05
  Speaker 2: say something about it through a book or script. I've
• 1:04:10
  Speaker 2: written a book called Tomorrow's the Same Day, reviving Dr. Kananga,
• 1:04:19
  Speaker 2: Return of Dr. Kananga. It was from the company with
• 1:04:24
  Speaker 2: Nelson Thor of the Toronto Star, Nelson Thor Enterprises, and
• 1:04:32
  Speaker 2: a company that I've helped form. Both of them are
• 1:04:35
  Speaker 2: going to produce a number of films. Tomorrow's the same day.
• 1:04:40
  Speaker 2: We'll deal with Canango when he rescues himself from James Bond.
• 1:04:46
  Speaker 2: Because of James Bond's parody. So that's my first I
• 1:04:53
  Speaker 2: think through Dr. Kananga, we will see ourselves. That's the
• 1:05:02
  Speaker 2: only way that we can talk about what's going on
• 1:05:05
  Speaker 2: in our society. It's to do it through movies, do
• 1:05:11
  Speaker 2: it through book writing. You can't do it through demonstrations anymore. Dr.
• 1:05:16
  Speaker 2: King told his story. He laid the platform. But we
• 1:05:19
  Speaker 2: have to do it through... storytelling, to get our heroes
• 1:05:26
  Speaker 2: and heroines back in place again. That's going to happen.
• 1:05:29
  Speaker 2: And it needs to decide it's only the artist that
• 1:05:32
  Speaker 2: does it.
• 1:05:33
  Speaker 4: That's what I've always found with this. It's like we
• 1:05:35
  Speaker 4: get together and discuss film and art in general, and
• 1:05:38
  Speaker 4: I think we get so much more out of that
• 1:05:40
  Speaker 4: than most things out there in the world. I think
• 1:05:43
  Speaker 4: just examining art is way more interesting than most things
• 1:05:47
  Speaker 4: out there.
• 1:05:48
  Speaker 2: And we shouldn't panic by what we see going on
• 1:05:50
  Speaker 2: around us, From the point of view, if we looked
• 1:05:52
  Speaker 2: at 16, 24, and 17, 24, 18, as a change
• 1:05:57
  Speaker 2: to the age, institutions that were supposed to those age
• 1:06:01
  Speaker 2: that changed and new institutions grew. And this thing is
• 1:06:06
  Speaker 2: changing so graphically that in another week these microphones will
• 1:06:13
  Speaker 2: be useless and throw them away. I mean, we're going
• 1:06:17
  Speaker 2: through this change. Why do we think we go through
• 1:06:20
  Speaker 2: changes without revolution? Social revolution is beyond me. Internet and
• 1:06:27
  Speaker 2: other innovations, time annihilators, have changed everybody's heads, man. And
• 1:06:35
  Speaker 2: some people don't want to see that change.
• 1:06:36
  Speaker 4: It's faster than we can process. These last 20 years,
• 1:06:40
  Speaker 4: I don't know if the human brain is prepared for
• 1:06:42
  Speaker 4: the stuff that's been thrown at it.
• 1:06:43
  Speaker 2: That's right. And the stuff that's been thrown at us
• 1:06:47
  Speaker 2: They're holding back on what they have. You know? They're
• 1:06:52
  Speaker 2: holding back stuff, innovations that have been created already. They're
• 1:06:57
  Speaker 2: just giving you a little taste of what's coming. You
• 1:07:00
  Speaker 2: ain't another 25, 30 years.
• 1:07:02
  Speaker 4: Blow your mind.
• 1:07:03
  Speaker 2: Blow your mind. Just the way the people who are
• 1:07:05
  Speaker 2: depending on the horse and wagon and the buggy and
• 1:07:09
  Speaker 2: the post office rider and all those things then, the
• 1:07:12
  Speaker 2: sheriff and town, managing them with their boardwalk streets and
• 1:07:17
  Speaker 2: you know, the way they did things. Imagine how they
• 1:07:20
  Speaker 2: felt when the train rolled in, the car rolled in,
• 1:07:23
  Speaker 2: the car and the airplane. I mean, it just wiped
• 1:07:25
  Speaker 2: them out. I talked to old people who remember the
• 1:07:27
  Speaker 2: first car. They freaked out and ran inside the house.
• 1:07:31
  Speaker 2: You know, it was typical of the devil. Guys were
• 1:07:34
  Speaker 2: reading the Bible when they saw a car coming down
• 1:07:36
  Speaker 2: the road. Oh, Jesus is coming. They freaked out completely.
• 1:07:41
  Speaker 2: We did not accept it. You know, airplane has nothing.
• 1:07:46
  Speaker 2: You know, Oh, I missed that flight. It's not the way.
• 1:07:49
  Speaker 2: It's crowded. It's crowded.
• 1:07:51
  Speaker 4: I'll catch the next flight. Yeah, so run of the mill.
• 1:07:54
  Speaker 2: So run of the mill. Oh, Jesus Christ. What's happening
• 1:07:57
  Speaker 2: to flying these days? What's happening to flying these days?
• 1:08:01
  Speaker 2: Are you real for real? Listen to what you're saying there.
• 1:08:05
  Speaker 2: We can't fly the way we used to. Check yourself out, man.
• 1:08:08
  Speaker 4: We're flying from one country to another.
• 1:08:11
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 1:08:12
  Speaker 4: That should be amazing.
• 1:08:13
  Speaker 2: Tripping, man. Get yourself some marijuana and sit down and
• 1:08:16
  Speaker 2: listen to what you just said. We shouldn't even be flying. Really,
• 1:08:21
  Speaker 2: you know? We should be walking. We should say, God,
• 1:08:23
  Speaker 2: just walk. Not entirely flying. Faster. You know, faster. And
• 1:08:29
  Speaker 2: we got the stuff to go faster. Did you know that?
• 1:08:33
  Speaker 4: We're Always pushing, again, maybe more than we can handle.
• 1:08:37
  Speaker 2: Do you know that this thing called Beaming Up and Down, Scotty,
• 1:08:42
  Speaker 2: that was premiered on Star Trek, we have it developed.
• 1:08:48
  Speaker 2: They can take you and send you to New York
• 1:08:50
  Speaker 2: and we have it.
• 1:08:54
  Speaker 4: I don't think we're ready for that either.
• 1:08:57
  Speaker 2: They got it.
• 1:08:58
  Speaker 4: I'm sure it will be out.
• 1:08:59
  Speaker 2: Before long. They got it. They can send you. You
• 1:09:03
  Speaker 2: can be beamed up and down now. That's crazy.
• 1:09:08
  Speaker 4: Did you have anything else overall you wanted to throw
• 1:09:11
  Speaker 4: in there?
• 1:09:12
  Speaker 2: I don't think so.
• 1:09:13
  Speaker 6: This has been fascinating.
• 1:09:14
  Speaker 2: Good, good.
• 1:09:15
  Speaker 4: Did you have anything else you wanted to tell people
• 1:09:17
  Speaker 4: as far as projects coming up other than the one
• 1:09:19
  Speaker 4: you just mentioned?
• 1:09:20
  Speaker 2: The one I'm producing? Yeah. No, other than the fact
• 1:09:24
  Speaker 2: that I'm excited about going into business with Nelson Thorpe.
• 1:09:29
  Speaker 2: His family owns and created the Toronto Star. He's from
• 1:09:33
  Speaker 2: this entertainment company. And I brought my company with his.
• 1:09:37
  Speaker 2: And Tomorrow's the Same Day is the first project, which
• 1:09:43
  Speaker 2: is one of seven books. that we're going to publish
• 1:09:48
  Speaker 2: and bringing Dr. Kananga back is one of the exciting
• 1:09:53
  Speaker 2: things to do. So I'm very excited about that. Setting
• 1:09:57
  Speaker 2: up a deal with a Canadian man who's a stupid
• 1:10:02
  Speaker 2: businessman and son of Canada. I love Canada, man. I
• 1:10:06
  Speaker 2: really love it. So that's what I'm looking for. That's
• 1:10:09
  Speaker 2: what I'm excited about. Why am I not making any movies?
• 1:10:14
  Speaker 2: I do these conventions to promote my book. And I'm
• 1:10:20
  Speaker 2: not making movies because I get a lot of offers.
• 1:10:23
  Speaker 2: But there's nothing. It's the same thing I did before.
• 1:10:26
  Speaker 2: I get offers to play detectives. I get offers to
• 1:10:29
  Speaker 2: play doctors. I get offers to do all kinds of things.
• 1:10:32
  Speaker 2: But I'm not. There's nothing there, man.
• 1:10:36
  Speaker 4: There's no new Yafet Kodotai.
• 1:10:38
  Speaker 2: There's nothing there.
• 1:10:39
  Speaker 4: It's all just stuff you've already done.
• 1:10:41
  Speaker 2: I've done all of it. And a lot of it
• 1:10:43
  Speaker 2: comes from... There's nothing there. I would love to see
• 1:10:46
  Speaker 2: a script that was different, but there's nothing there. There's
• 1:10:49
  Speaker 2: absolutely nothing there. There's more jumping out of planes, running man.
• 1:10:55
  Speaker 2: I don't know what happened to writing. Nobody's writing anymore.
• 1:10:59
  Speaker 4: Now you have to write the stuff and create the project.
• 1:11:01
  Speaker 2: I'll have to create the project. That's awesome.
• 1:11:05
  Speaker 4: Well, thank you very much for talking with us today.
• 1:11:06
  Speaker 2: Thank you so much.
• 1:11:07
  Speaker 4: It's been such a pleasure.
• 1:11:08
  Speaker 2: My pleasure, man. Thank you.
• 1:11:24
  Speaker 4: Okay, so you listening, you were also mesmerized by that
• 1:11:28
  Speaker 4: crazy stories, the amount of information thrown at you by
• 1:11:32
  Speaker 4: Yafet Kodo. Is that not just the most amazing conversation?
• 1:11:37
  Speaker 4: I'm thrilled to have been sitting in the room with him,
• 1:11:39
  Speaker 4: but I'm just more so that it was recording this conversation.
• 1:11:44
  Speaker 5: How about you, Lucy?
• 1:11:45
  Speaker 1: Yeah, again, I have never experienced anything like that. And
• 1:11:49
  Speaker 1: such a sweet person.
• 1:11:50
  Speaker 4: Yeah, really nice. And kind of, again, for the amount,
• 1:11:56
  Speaker 4: I mean, you heard him throw out the numbers there,
• 1:11:57
  Speaker 4: the amount of work that he's done, the amount of
• 1:11:59
  Speaker 4: time he's logged in in the industry, and the stuff that,
• 1:12:03
  Speaker 4: as he said, he kind of broke ground on a
• 1:12:06
  Speaker 4: lot of different areas there, could have a huge ego
• 1:12:09
  Speaker 4: about it. He kind of doesn't in the real world.
• 1:12:11
  Speaker 4: Other than us making him talk about it, I feel
• 1:12:13
  Speaker 4: like he would probably never bring that kind of stuff up.
• 1:12:15
  Speaker 5: But we sort of opened the door there for him.
• 1:12:18
  Speaker 4: But yeah, it's interesting how... grounded and normal he seemed
• 1:12:22
  Speaker 4: to be as we came in the room and like
• 1:12:24
  Speaker 4: he's he's kind of a normal guy and yet has
• 1:12:27
  Speaker 4: the most amazing stories so thank you once again to
• 1:12:30
  Speaker 4: mr yafit koto for sitting down and talking with us
• 1:12:33
  Speaker 4: and um spread the word i think it was an
• 1:12:36
  Speaker 4: awesome discussion and tell people to go listen to it
• 1:12:40
  Speaker 4: anything else to pass along lucy thank you for joining
• 1:12:42
  Speaker 4: me this week otherwise that about does it we will
• 1:12:45
  Speaker 4: return next time same geek feed thanks for listening Thank you.
• 1:13:58
  Speaker 4: We'll be right.
• 1:14:07
  Speaker 2: Back.
• 1:14:21
  Speaker 3: Tom Landry's team was on the brink of elimination, even
• 1:14:24
  Speaker 3: though they had outfought and outfought the Vikings for 58 minutes.
• 1:14:28
  Speaker 6: That was incredible.
• 1:14:31
  Speaker 2: Yeah, great stories. You know, the truth always comes out right.
• 1:14:38
  Speaker 5: This episode is a production of Movie Meltdown, produced and
• 1:14:41
  Speaker 5: edited by the Auditude Studios, with opening music performed by
• 1:14:44
  Speaker 5: the Empires. For more on how to sponsor or support
• 1:14:47
  Speaker 5: the show, Email producer at moviemeltdown.com.
• 1:14:50
  Speaker 2: Talk hard!