Gilbert Gottfried's Amazing Colossal Podcast - 151. Tony Roberts

Episode Date: April 17, 2017

Veteran Broadway, TV and film actor Tony Roberts stops by the studio to hold court on a wide range of topics, including the intensity of Al Pacino, the minimalism of Robert Mitchum, the eccentricities of Jerome Robbins and the professionalism of Sidney Lumet. Also: Tony runs lines with Edward G. Robinson, takes flight with Mary Poppins, plays the ponies with Mickey Rooney and treads the boards with Abe Vigoda! PLUS: Everett Sloane! "Amityville 3-D"! Woody Allen hits the beach! Tony's mom dates Uncle Miltie! And Sydney Greenstreet meets...Sydney Greenstreet! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

That's the sound of unaged whiskey transforming into Jack Daniel's Tennessee whiskey in Lynchburg, Tennessee. Around 1860, Nearest Green taught Jack Daniel how to filter whiskey through charcoal for a smoother taste, one drop at a time. This is one of many sounds in Tennessee with a story to tell. To hear them in person, plan your trip at tnvacation.com. Tennessee sounds perfect. Hi, this is Gilbert Gottfried, and this is Gilbert Gottfried's Amazing Colossal Podcast. I'm here with my co-host, Frank Santopadre, and we're once again recording at Nutmeg with our engineer, Frank Furtarosa. Our guest this week is a familiar, versatile, and busy actor who's been working pretty much

nonstop since the 1960s. Notable TV appearances include Love American Style, Rod Serling's Night Gallery, Macmillan and Wife, The Love Boat, Trapper John M.D., Seize the Day, Law and Order, The Carol Burnett Show, and his own short-lived series, Rosetti and Ryan. and his own short-lived series, Rosetti and Ryan. You may also know him from memorable film roles, including Serpico, The Taking of the Pelham 123, Switch, Just Tell Me What You Want, 18 Again,

Amity Bill 3D, and of course, six collaborations with his longtime friend, Woody Allen, including Hannah and Her Sisters, Radio Days, Play It Again Sam, and Annie Hall. But it was The Great White Way where he really made his mark, starring in 23 Broadway shows, including Barefoot in the Park, Don't Drink the Water, They're Playing Our Song, Promises, Promises, Sugar, Jerome Robbins Broadway, Cabaret, Xanadu, and Victor Victoria. In a long and successful career he's worked with Edward G. Robinson, Jose Ferrer, Milton Burle, Walter Matthau, Catherine Deneuve, George Burns, Julie Andrews, Al Pacino, and yes, even Paul Lynn.

Ava Goda and Topo Gigio. Now that, my friends, is what you call range. It's called research. That's what's called research. His new memoir is called Do You Know Me? Please welcome to the show one of our favorite actors and a man who once passed out in Lee Strasberg's

bathroom. The multi-talented Tony Roberts. Thank you very much. Thank you very much, Gilbert. You know, I think the last time we spoke, or first time, it was when I was hosting USA Up all night. And I think you came on as a guest.

I'm ashamed to say, Gilbert, the last time I thought we were together was in a pool hall on 8th Avenue. Do you remember that? I don't know what it was. It was some kind of a promotional thing that we did. Oh, that could have been, yes. Gilbert was in a pool hall. Yes.

Yeah, I'm like Paul Newman. You're just like Fast Eddie Felsen. That's it. That's it. But I don't remember the other one, but that's probably the one. Yeah, I'm trying to block it out of my head, too. Was Tony doing a horror film at the time? He made a film called Popcorn, which would have fit into Up All Night.

Oh, that would have made sense. I don't know, but we made that in Jamaica. Not Jamaica, Queens. Jamaica, the Caribbean, which was a strange place to make a movie because they have no movie industry there. But you can hire a lot of people for no money. Oh, yeah. So the Canadians who I think were involved in that brought a lot of English cameramen

and so on and so forth to Jamaica, and they hung me from the ceiling for about five hours a day in a harness as I was supposed to have been stabbed by a giant mosquito. It's the actor's life. It traveled on tracks and they had to keep redoing my makeup because it didn't look real anymore. So someone would have to come up on a ladder and I don't like heights. So I was not happy doing that picture. Popcorn.

It got only two good reviews, but one was in the New York Times and one was in the Los Angeles Times. I was lucky. And did this ever get released in this country? Yes, it did. It did. It got a favorable review. Yeah, Ray Walston's in it.

That's correct. Yeah. And your favorite, Dee Wallace. Oh, wow. Who we have to get on the show. They got to get Dee Wallace. Yeah. Yes.

And now I saw the name on the list of people you've worked with, so I have to always ask. Milton Berle. Milton Berle happened to have dated my mother when they were in high school. Love that. So Milton was like an uncle in a sense in that he was frequently in our apartment and he was usually very funny and on and full of energy. And he was always very good to me when I was 11, 12, 13, I remember. And then when I was 22 and he was doing Take Her, She's Mine in Las Vegas, I was submitted for it by my agency and I got the part. And so Milton and I were on stage together in Vegas for about a five week run. Kind of surreal. A guy you grew up with. He was in the house, and now he's your co-star. Correct. But he was a great tutor, and he was a taskmaster. I learned very quickly from working with him,

because if you didn't say the setup line the way he wanted to hear it, he would say to you on stage in front of the crowd, What? And you'd go, you know, you wanted to faint. And you'd think, what? He said to me, what? My next line doesn't fit with that at all. I guess he wants me to say that line again.

So I would say it again and then he would go on with his line and he'd come over to me and he'd say, you know, when I get a laugh, it's not my laugh, it's our laugh. And he said, I can't get it unless you've set the thing up right. He said, I just can't do it. And he said, I can't get it unless you've set the thing up right. He said, I just can't do it.

And he said, and I have to see your eyes because that's where my timing comes from. And it was a great lesson as a young actor who, you know, had not yet learned how to do that. I heard he was like a dictator, the way he would do those. He knew everything that was going on on the stage. He knew if a light went out, if a light on a rail someplace that was pointing down had burned out among, you know, maybe 30 or 40 other lights that were hanging up there, he would comment on it at the end of the show to the stage manager. He knew absolutely everything that was going on at every moment. And I used to watch him from the wings because he would go on after the play was over and he'd do

about a kind of improvisational 10 or 15 minutes thing with the audience. Because in Vegas, they'd never been to see plays in any of the big rooms before. It was a big experiment he did because the business was running out of stars who could entertain an audience for an hour and a half by themselves. Those guys were becoming relics. So the theory was we could do an abbreviated version of a Broadway hit in an hour and a half and people would come in and see that. And that's why we did the play there. But he would still feel he needed, he was obliged to give the audience what they wanted from Milton Berle, which was some of the usual shtick but he would still feel he needed, he was obliged to give the audience what they wanted from Milton Berle, which was some of the usual shtick where he would stand in front of

them and tell jokes. And I would watch his routine every night and every night from the wings, I would think he's going to do it different tonight. It's going to be different. He's going to say a different joke. And I was wrong every time, but he was such a good actor that he made me think that he was going to tell it differently. And he never did. It was always exactly the same. And he always got the laughs. He always got it. But he told it as if he'd never told it before.

And I always admired that. Now, most importantly. Uh-oh. You know what he's going to ask you, Tom? Did you see Milton Berle's penis? I heard about his penis. And he told me that he once was in the bathroom with Forrest Tucker. Oh, my God.

Who also had a very good reputation for being large in that area. And he turned to, they were standing at urinals. Oh, this is finished for me. I'm over after this. He said, Milton said to him, tell you what, Forrest, you take out yours and I'll take out just enough to beat you. Yeah, that's it. There's variations on that story.

Well, one of them is that it's Tom Jones and Milton Berle. Another one is Forrest Tucker. There's variations on that story. Well, one of them is that it's Tom Jones and Milton Berle. Another one is Forrest Tucker. There's variations on this. I heard there was one with Tom Jones where they start to unzip, and Tom Jones looks at Milton Berle as he's unzipping, and he goes, okay. I'm out. Yeah. I give.

I give. By the way, you broke your record. I think out. Yeah. I give. I give. By the way, you broke your record. I think it was nine minutes or eight minutes. Yes. The fastest Milton Beruch long reference. Well, it's just like people were angry at me because we interviewed Jamie Farr, who's worked a lot with Danny Thomas. And I didn't mention Danny Thomas. I'm glad.

For accolades. I'm glad. Now, there's a story in the book about Miltie, too. And when you were a kid, your dad walking in the room and saying, we're going to the racetrack with Miltie and Mickey Rooney. Well, I was about, I think I was around 11, 10 or 11 years old. And my father came into my room and he said, get dressed. We're going to the racetrack with Milton Berle and Mickey Rooney. And I'd never met Mickey Rooney, although I knew who he was as much as you can know when you're 11 years old.

And we went downstairs and we got in a waiting limousine. And I laughed harder in that car to and from that racetrack than I've ever laughed since. They were shouting at people out the car window? They were doing improvisatory Shakespeare. They were doing ad-lib iambic pentameter together. They were finishing jokes together. They were hollering at people out the windows. I never heard the words they'd used before.

But it was wonderful. It was wonderful. And the thing I remember vividly was that when Milton, again, everything takes place in a bathroom in this show. Milton and I go to the bathroom and everybody who saw him came over

and wanted to shake his hand because they felt so intimately connected to him because he'd been in their living rooms every Tuesday night at eight o'clock or whatever it was. And they felt they knew him like he was a cousin or something. And I thought, wow, wouldn't it be great to be famous? You'd have all these friends. Everybody is your friend if they recognize you, if you're someone they've seen. And I really think at that age and everything like that, that had some kind of a, there was a lesson in there to me somewhere.

We should give it a context too. If the listeners are wondering, how did your dad just happen to walk into the room and say, we're going to the racetrack with Milton Berle? Your dad was in show business. My father was a radio and television, a radio announcer and a star in radio of many very important programs in the 40s and whatnot. And he was the announcer on the Milton Berle show as well, as well as on the Frank Sinatra show. Ken Roberts. I met these guys. Yes, Kenneth Ken Roberts.

And it's funny because Milton Berle was known as Uncle Miltie. Uncle Miltie. So he was definitely everyone's uncle. Yeah, yeah. Well. And he had a giant penis. Well, that's important to note. I may want to work again, Gilbert.

Now, your dad was Ken Roberts, who was not just a radio announcer. He worked with Orson Welles. He worked with one of his childhood friends. I was telling this to Gilbert, was the actor Paul Stewart from Citizen Kane. He was the guy. He almost sounded like Bale Lugosi in Citizen Kane. He was doing this voice. Oh, yes, that's right.

Oh, yes. You can keep on asking questions if you want. When he's showing him, the guy comes to ask about Rosebud. He said, oh, yes, Rosebud. I remember, yes. You can Rosebud. I remember, yes. I remember that night. Obviously I'm not doing it well enough to provoke the laughs that I want from you guys.

But that sounds exactly like Paul Stewart. It's the best Paul Stewart I've heard. How many people do you know who do Paul Stewart? And also my cousin Everett Sloan was in Citizen. There you go. I didn't want to tell. I said to Gilbert when I got into the room tonight, I said, where do you find out who Tony's cousin was? I didn't want to tell him. Everett Sloan. Can you do an Edward Everett Sloan imitation?

I can't do Everett's imitation because Everett was always doing voices at parties and places and families. And that was startling to a young kid. I mean, coming in, suddenly he'd be an Italian doorman. Or he'd be a Russian spy. Or he'd be something with an accent. And you never knew who he was. I mean, I didn't feel as if I ever intimately knew Everett. I knew characters he portrayed to be fun and to be funny and to be amusing. But it just came with the territory of

being an actor i guess see we've discussed well there were at least two i can think of um who we've discussed on the show one was peter sellers and the other was sid caesar who didn't exist if they weren't in character yes i, I understand. Yes, I understand. There are those people and then there are people who refuse to be anything when they come to the set because they put themselves into the character they're playing. I mean, in movies and people

like that, you know, they come to the set, they don't even necessarily relate to anybody on any level because they're inside their head, they're already the other character and they're inside their head. They're already the other character, and they're saving it for the take. Was Pacino like that? No.

Pacino was not as fully committed to that as apparently Robert Duvall is, and there have been others. But no, Al was pretty accessible. He always struck me as he would be like the craziest of the method actors. Well, I didn't. Serpico, of course. He was serious about the craft, and he was certainly seeking some kind of honesty in his work.

But then we all are, and we all try to do that. And, you know, there's a time right before they say roll them when everybody kind of pulls themselves together and, you know, they're entering dreamland, which is what they're supposed to do if they're actors. We jump around a lot on this show, Tony, as you'll see. I've noticed that. It's a little like being in the third degree. I've never been interviewed by two people sitting,

and we're in a triangle here, folks. And I'm in the corner. There's no escape. And, you know, I'm not wearing any special handcuffs or anything like that, but I feel like I'm a little under the gun. It's a little bit like that. But we'll jump around a little bit. But now that we're talking about Serpico, tell Gilbert about working with Sidney Lumet because he's somebody who comes up on this show a lot. Oh, yes. Oh, Sidney was great. Sidney was a delight. Went to work very fast, very quickly. You know, didn't want to do a lot of takes. Usually got it in two or three and gave me a great piece of direction. That's worth repeating, I guess, to anybody out there who's an actor. I did a take during Serpico. I was a scene where I'm listening to somebody go on and on and on. And the camera was doing my single. And when it was over,

Sidney came over to me. And one of the nice things he did was to always give you notes privately so nobody else would hear what he was telling you, you know, which is a respectful thing to do so you don't get notes in front of the other cast. So he said to me, listen, he said, that last take was very good. He said, that was excellent. I don't want you to change anything. He said, do just what you did the last time. He said, this time, don't show it to me.

And I suddenly felt liberated, as I think any actor would feel liberated hearing that from the director, because it means you don't have to tell the story. And the temptation as the actor, who we like to think of ourselves as storytellers, but if it's well written and you're doing it right, you shouldn't be telling a story. You should be the story in a way. And that'll happen if you've prepared yourself properly.

But most actors want to lay in that other layer of just make sure you get it. That's interesting. And that's what the good actors don't do. They don't do that. They don't make sure you get it. They do it and they trust the fact that it will be there. I made a picture once with Richard Fleischer, Amityville 3D, and we were in Mexico shooting in Mexico City or something and he told me he'd made

a picture with Robert Mitchum and Mitchum was supposed to be watching a fire and the camera was on his face and Fleischer went up to him after the take and said I don't see it happening in your eyes Bob it's just I don't see it I don't see it. I don't see it registering. And Mitchum just said to him, it's there. I don't think we need to do it again. You'll see it in the, uh, in the dailies. And Fleischer wasn't going to push it with Robert Mitchum, who was a huge star. And, uh, sure enough, Mitchum was absolutely right. In the dailies, blown up on the big screen, you can see the surface of his eyeball registering with credibility and honesty what he had been looking at, which was this fire. Love that.

So it's nice, but it's tricky as to how much or how little you should do. There was a story that Jack Lemmon told. Maybe he was working with Wilder. Wilder. And he said he did a scene and he said, okay, a little less. And then he did again and a little less. And he kept saying a little less. And then finally, Lemmon just lost it.

And he says, pretty soon I won't be acting at all. And he goes, oh, God, yes. Yes, of course. The adage I like is you spend half of your career learning how to act, and you spend the second half of your career learning how not to act. You know, it's a kind of an art. There's another way of saying it. If you're watching it, you're not to act. You know, it's a kind of an art. There's another way of saying it. If you're watching it, you're not doing it.

And if you're doing it, you're not watching it. You can't do both at the same time. And yet you can because Othello doesn't really kill Desdemona, but he has to make everybody believe that he killed Desdemona. So how does he do that without actually strangling Desdemona? And as you know, there was a movie made about this with Ronald Coleman, the name of which escapes me, but I'll think about it. Is that when he was the actor?

Who was Ronald Coleman? Does he play an actor? He's playing an actor. Is it a double life? It's a double life. Thank you. Well, bravo. And jumping again, you were in an episode of Night Gallery called The Messiah of Mott Street.

Correct. With Edward G. Robinson. Yeah. Who also comes up a lot on this show. Oh, yeah. We talked about him a lot. Yeah. He comes up a lot on my videos at home because I love to watch old movies and I watch anything he's in, a million times.

But I had a wonderful experience with him he asked me to come into his trailer and run lines with him and I thought holy smoke I'm gonna run lines with you were a very young actor I was about 31 32 I think and I I played his doctor and we went into his trailer and he said, you have to forgive me. He said, for wanting to do this, he said, but I'm, I'm very nervous. I'm always nervous on the first day. And my jaw dropped. And I said, Mr. Robinson, you've made 186 movies. How could you still be nervous?

And he said, I'm always nervous until they see the dailies and they, they approve me and they know I'm right for the part, I'm always nervous until they see the dailies and they approve me and they know I'm right for the part or I'm in it because they can get rid of you real quick if they don't like what they see on the first day. This is from Edward G. Robinson, the, you know, royalty of our profession. Anyway, he had a long monologue to do and about halfway through it, he stopped and he said I apologize to everybody you know they're about 60 guys with lights and cameras and all that he said I'm so

sorry he said years ago this wouldn't have bothered me he said but the man who does the focus you know there's a guy who brings a little tape measure from the lens to the face of the actor who's being shot and he said I know you're trying to help me, he says to this guy, he said, but you're mouthing the words along with me as I'm saying them. And I can see it out of the corner of my eye. And he said, I'm so sorry, but it just took me

off my lines. And then, of course, this poor guy who did the measuring probably hasn't stopped running now. To this day, he's still fleeing Hollywood. But at any rate, Edward Gee then did the entire thing letter perfect the second time through, and that was it. And I remember asking him if he liked doing a lot of takes, as some actors do. He said, not me.

He said, it's usually the best on the second take, sometimes the third. He said, but after that, he said, for me, it's always been downhill, which is funny because, you know, you talk about some directors and they want, William Wyler, for instance, I don't think ever did anything in less than 25 takes.

And now that you work in digital instead of film, there's no expense in doing 25 takes. And now that you work in digital instead of film, there's no expense in doing many takes. So everything you do, the simplest setups, are done over and over and over again to please anybody who has an opinion about whether they thought it was good or not, or they like the way your hair was combed or the way your tie fell to the left or the right or whatever.

They call it the video village these days. But it's a group of associate producers who sit off the set with screens in front of them, computer screens, and they see exactly what the cameraman sees. And it used to be the cameraman was the only one who really saw anything. And the director would check with him after each take and he'd say, no, there's a shadow on the back wall, we have to do it again, or the light jiggled or something. Now you've got four or five people each making a comment, and each of them gets to have their say about a particular, another take.

And it makes it very difficult for the actors because the actors are trying to find that odd spot where it's spontaneous and they don't really know what's going to happen in the next second or two and doing it over and over and over makes that more and more difficult okay just when the show is starting to get good we we're going to throw a monkey wrench into the works with this commercial word. And now back to the podcasting stylings of Gilbert Gottfried. You think Lumet, because he was an actor,

had a, had an insight into directing actors? I'm sure it did. Yeah. I'm sure you did two films for him. You did just, just tell me what you want as well with Alan King. That's right. That's, sure it did. Yeah, I'm sure. You did two films for him. You did Just Tell Me What You Want as well with Alan King. That's right. That's correct. Yeah. We started this

show about 175 or 200 episodes ago. And one of the first people that came up and continues to get mentions on this show is Sidney Lumet. Really? We've gone. Yes, we've talked at length about The Pawnbroker and we've talked at length about Dog Day Afternoon. And Long Day's Journey. And Long Day's Journey. Oh, yeah. Wonderful. Yeah, he loves Bye Bye Braverman.

Yeah, Bye Bye Braverman is the one I like. With Jessica. Yeah. Jessica Walter. Right, who I was in acting class with when I was 11 years old. Love that. Found that in the book. Oh, yeah.

That's in the book. That's a great little gem. Yeah. years old. Love that. Found that in the book. Oh, yeah. That's in the book. And they always say with, like, Lumet, the star of his films was always New York.

Well, I... He was familiar with the streets. He knew the crew. They usually used the same people. It was like family to work on that picture. Or both pictures the interesting thing about Serpico that I found in doing my research

and did not know that it started it started life with Sam Peckinpah of all people you notice that it was briefly developed as a Redford Newman project? no I didn't know that that your character Bob Blair is

supposedly is based on Serpico's partner. David Dirk. David Dirk. And it was going to be a buddy. It was originally developed before Lumet, I guess, got his hands on the project and changed the focus to being just Serpico. Right. And David Dirk became, got a lesser. Well, there are so many versions about that story. With all due respect, I may not be true. I had been contacted or was put in touch with David Dirk, who was not happy about the fact that I heard that he wasn't David Dirk in the movie. He was this other guy, Bob Blair, for legal reasons. Because they didn't have to pay David Dirk for anything that he might have, that they had to pay Serpico for,

as far as I know. Serpico was the subject of the story. And Serpico made, got famous. And Serpico became a hero, as he was. And in real life, Dirk was a hero too and he didn't feel he was being portrayed that way and I was giving an interview in front of a group of people at NYU or something like that and he was there and he stood up at the middle of this, I don't know, 800 people or something and started to criticize the film and I found myself defending the film and saying to him I always thought you were a hero Mr. Dirk and I still do I said but I didn't write the film and I didn't produce the film and I said

I'm just an actor I came and I learned the lines and I tried to give it as much conviction as I could but your argument is not with me. And he accepted that, but he still wanted to make a point that it wasn't just the way you see it. It's not a documentary movie. It's not a docudrama, even, which they call so many things these days. It was a piece of entertainment. And, you know, they made the best movie, the best story they wanted to make and tell. Where are you supposed to go from here?

9-3 Precinct, plain clothes. Put your gun away. You? I am scheduled to go on special assignment with the Mayor's Department of Investigations, Detective Squad. Scheduled to go on special assignment with the mayor's department of investigations detective squad Us gold shield No four years in plain clothes Who do you know I make it my business to know people people who can help unfair Unfair Life Unfair.

Life is unfair. I mean, look, you've got a feel for the streets, and I've got a feel for the politics, I guess. Oh, yeah? I mean, you and me in one Batmobile, we'd clean up the whole city in no time. I wonder if we can get candy out of this machine. And you think the thing about it starting out as a Redford Newman vehicle may not be true.

I never heard that. Yeah, interesting. I'm going to do some extra research on that because now I'm curious. All right. The Paul Stewart thing is the one that still gets me. What's that? From Citizen Kane. Well, he was a childhood friend of Tony's dad.

Yes, they grew up together in New York City. They'd known each other since boyhood. Because I remember Paul Stewart and Citizen Kane, he's like the butler or whatever. That's right. And it's obvious he's like full of shit. He wants to get the money that the reporter could pay him and he wants the credit and afterwards the reporter says,

I didn't get anything out of this. Well, I can tell you some more. Yes, well, sure. Oh, yeah. That's very much who he was in that role, in that character. He was also in Bad and the Beautiful. He was excellent in that. Oh, yes, he is. That's right. That's right.

Yeah. That's right. Yeah. And he was in a window. And he had the lead in a picture called The Window. If you remember The Window. I don't know that one. Was with Arthur Kennedy and Ruth Roman about a boy who sees a murder through a window from a fire escape.

And Paul is the murderer and sets out to have to get rid of this kid. So was he one of your influences? I mean, your dad was in show business. Your mom had dabbled in show business. Your mom worked for the animator Max Fleischer. Yes. My mother never aspired to be an actress at all. But she was a girl Friday for Max Fleischer, who had studios not far from where we now sit. And we should say Fleischer was Popeye. That's right. Betty Boop.

Yeah. What does your mom do for Max Fleischer? What did my mom do for Max Fleischer? Didn't she dangle? She did. She was a stenographer. She was a secretary. She was.

Oh, I know what you're referring to. Yes, she also held the baton that held the ball that bounced on top of the words in the Follow the Bouncing Ball movies. Isn't that cool, Gil? So she wore a black glove all the way and held this thing. Maybe that's where I got my musical talent. I don't know. Whatever I have. But that was one of her tasks. And years later, you wind up working for Fleischer's son, Richard Fleischer.

Yes, which had nothing to do with it. Complete coincidence. Yeah, fun. I remember the original Fleischer cartoons. I always liked because there was something nightmarish about them. Hmm. They were like very haunting. Uh-huh.

Uh-huh. Well, they were black and white, of course. Yeah. And maybe that gave it a quality of harshness, perhaps, or something, or realism. I don't know. And you worked with Walter Matthau. Well, not really. I have to qualify that.

Walter Matthau. We have to go back and edit the intro now. That was a really. I have to qualify that. Walter Matthau. We have to go back and edit the intro now. Is it tremendous? No, you don't. I'll explain it now. Anybody still here? Did you do a pilot with him?

I did a pilot based on the film Guide for the Married Man. Oh, my God. And Walter had been in that movie with Bobby Morse. Yeah.

Who you did work with. Who I did work with on Broadway. But Walter, as a favor to the producer, been in that movie. Yes. With Bobby Morse. Yeah. Who you did work with. Who I did work with on Broadway. But Walter, as a favor to the producer, did a bit in the pilot that we made out of Guide for the Married Man. And he played a small little scene or something like that. And we happened to cross paths as I was getting made up to do a scene that same day. And he came over to say something very nice to me and he said uh well tony he said i wish you good let me see if i can do my walter mouth oh are you felix i'm asking

you nicely don't clean up but it's pretty good not in other words those are the very words but walter said to me tony said i hope it sells if you want, or I hope it doesn't sell. He said, you know, sometimes it's better if it doesn't sell, which was completely perplexing to me at age 27 or whatever I was when I made this thing, because I thought, how can it be good if it doesn't sell? That's the whole point, is that we're here to make it sell. And in time, I came to appreciate the fact that it didn't sell. And it was one of about four pilots I made that didn't sell. And I made five or four pilots that did sell that were on the air for half a season or something like that. But- Well, we remember Rossetti and Ryan. Well, I think that was

on longer than any of the others. And that was a big heralded show for NBC and that was supposed to be a big deal. But, you know, sometimes it's better that those things don't hang around. Didn't Sam Wanamaker give you similar

advice? Sam Wanamaker. On the opening night of my first Broadway play, I was 21 years old, and the reviews came in to Sardi's, and they were terrible. And I was sitting with Sam, who was also a friend of my dad's, at a table, and Sam said to me, this is the best thing that could happen to you, kid. And I said, why is that? And he said, because if you get into a hit right away, he said, you'll get stuck. He said, you'll stop learning and you'll get used to the money and you'll hang around for a

couple of years and you won't grow. He said, the best thing it could do is to be in about three or four flops in a row. He said, you'll meet a lot of different actors. You'll learn something from all of them and you'll get your stage feet, and you'll get your confidence, and then you can be in the hit and start spending a little money or something. He said, but this is the way you should start. And it turned out that he was right. But at the time, it felt pretty bad. Of course, you're looking for a hit. You're looking for something to sustain you. You're looking for employment. Sure. Closing two weeks, and're looking for a hit. You're looking for something to sustain you. You're looking for employment. Sure. Closing two weeks and you say goodbye

to everybody. Yeah, and tell Gilbert about you. You also shared the stage with Sal Mineo and Kevin McCarthy, another actor we've talked about on the show. Well, that was the play that got the bad reviews. The one that closed. Yeah, with Sal Mineo and Ralph Meeker and Kevin McCarthy. How about these names,

Gil? Oh, my God, yeah. Yeah, in one play. And Dory Shari, of course, who had been the head of MGM, and he directed it, and he was a lovely man, lovely man. But we had other people in that cast, too, who went on. David Doyle was in it. Oh, sure, from Charlie's Angels. That's right.

David Doyle. Yes. He did a lot of work. Yeah, yeah. And Gretchen Walther, who became a good, who was a good actress to begin with. We were in Northwestern together. Just a little backstory, too, just about how you became an actor. I mean, your dad was in show business.

Your dad wanted you. Your dad was an announcer. His dad was an announcer on You Are There. Oh, geez. And also The Shadow. Yes. And all of these wonderful radio shows, these classic radio shows. But he wanted something different for you.

Yeah, he wanted me to be a solvent. He wanted me to be a doctor or a lawyer or something sensible like anybody would want their kid to be. Not an actor. Yeah. I mean, that was the craziest thing to do. It's touching, too, in the book when you go to work with him and you meet the other radio actors. And they're also giving you similar advice. Yes.

You don't want to struggle your whole life. Well, to put it more accurately, if I may. Sure. I was going to the studios, the radio studios with my dad when I was six and seven and eight years old. And I, at that age, had no idea of what it meant to be an actor or to make a living or anything like that. What I was exposed to were grown-ups, adults, in ties good guys, bad guys, cowboys, Indians. Their voices and their demeanor, their faces changed with such intense conviction that

it was better than playing with my playmates. We were all pretending. But here were these grown-ups pretending, and they were getting paid to do it. So that was a seduction I was available for. It wasn't until I was a teenager, and I spoke to a lot of actors and things like that who all said, don't do this. Don't do it. Do something else. You'll, you know, and my father told me the same thing. He said, it's a tough business and the competition is terrible and it's, you know, it's no good.

And when I finally got to be of college age or just before, he finally said, OK, if that's what you want to do then you must be the best at it that you can be you have to go to school you have to go to classes you have to go to the theater you have to really take it as seriously

as if you were going to be a doctor or a lawyer you've got to master that craft and go about getting a job in a sensible way I mean he used to make sure I was out of the house at nine or 10 o'clock in the morning with my resume and appropriately tired. And I didn't come back until five in the afternoon because I was supposed to

be out knocking on doors and going to auditions. And that's what everybody did in those days before the Internet and all the rest of the things that exist now. But in the old days, it was just shoe leather. You went and you got thrown out of a lot of offices all day. And that's what you did. But you made friends with the secretary who was going to be the agent in two years. Right. And the agent in two years is going to need clients. And you're going to be one of the clients because you schmoozed and you were nice and you said hello and you kept in touch

and you sent a postcard when you were in a play or you did a reading or anything. And gradually, they begin to think, hey, this guy's serious. He's going to show up on opening night because everybody wants to, in a sense, be in the limelight. And not everybody is all that responsible. And they don't know who to trust. So doing that shoe leather work at the beginning of the career was a good thing to do. And it helped. And how did you meet Woody Allen? I was in Barefoot in the Park on Broadway.

I'd been in it for 18 months. I replaced Robert Redford. And they made you straighten your hair. And they made me straighten my hair. You read that book, didn't you? I listened to the seven-hour audio version, my friend. Holy smoke. What's going to come up next?

It is like being under the... Anyway. I told Tony when we got started, I said, it's a little like This Is Your Life without Ralph Edwards. Or the commercials. Or the commercials. Yeah. Where were we? How you met Woody Allen. Oh, how I met Woody Allen. So I was in Barefoot in the Park and my agent sent me on an audition to go audition for Woody Allen's first play on Broadway called Don't Drink the Water. And I went to the

audition and David Merrick, apparently, who was producing it and who was the biggest producer in New York at the time, used to have a sign on his wall that said, it's not enough that we succeed, our competitors must fail. I'll tell you something about him. Yes, he also sent out Christmas cards with Santa Claus hanging from a noose that he thought was funny. But David wanted me in the play. I didn't know David to know him by David. I just never even knew who he was. I just knew David Merrick wanted me for this play. And apparently Woody didn't think I was right for it or good enough for it.

And I went back, I think, four times to audition for it. And finally, after about a month had gone by, and I went back, I think, four times to audition for it. And finally, after about a month had gone by and I'd auditioned four times, Woody walked into my dressing room at the Biltmore Theater where I was doing Barefoot. And he said, gee, you're very good. He said, you've got the part. He said, why are you such a terrible auditioner? he said why are you such a terrible auditioner which wasn't a surprise to me because I don't think any actor ever thinks he's a good auditioner it's the most terrible process you know we've talked about how much Gilbert hates oh there's nothing worse there's nothing worse it's dreamt up by the devil but he saw a performance that I obviously was comfortable doing and knew,

and it was suitable for what he wanted me to do in Don't Drink the Water. And that was the beginning of it. And he was very shy, as he still is, but in those days it was double shy. So we hardly ever exchanged words of any kind together. He kept in the background, really, and I didn't get to know him well at all at the end of that run. It was really two or three years later when I played against Sam, and he was in it as well. And then we really were, were you know we had dressing rooms

next to one another and you know we had a lot of time to kill in between acts and shows and what not and we began a very you know deeper friendship during that time and of course Keaton was in that

play as well and the three of us enjoyed teasing each other. And apparently that has resonated somewhere. I remember seeing Play It Again, Sam, with my father on Broadway when they would still give these, like, half-price tickets. I was out of it by that time. No, you were in it. And I remember Jerry Lacey.

Yes. On Dark Shadows. That's right. He's still around, by the way. Jerry Lacey did the best Bogart. He was Bogart in that play. And he looked a little like Bogart. And he was good.

He was good. I miss him. There's a story, a couple of stories in the book. The story where Woody comes to the beach house, and you compare him going into the water like Norman Maine in A Star is Born. Yeah. Everybody on the beach did. In fact, he closed Ocean Beach when he went in the water.

It was a sight to behold. I don't know why he wanted to wear a white skull cap. But he did. I mean't know why he wanted to wear a white skull cap, but he did. Like, I mean, he didn't have enough. Well, I won't go there. But I mean, he was ridiculous looking. He also arrived for a two-night stay or a one-night stay at my family's house with a valise larger than you'd take if you were going to Africa for three months, filled with medications and things for snake bite.

Where do you think you are? You're 40 minutes out of Manhattan. What are you crazy? He was prepared for anything. But we had fun. We had fun. You should tell the story. And this is something in the book that comes up a lot.

You say one of the things that people ask you the most. You were just asked when you walked in here tonight. You were asked by Paul Rayburn, our researcher, where the Max, the Max Max came from. Your son is named Max. Yeah. You beat me to that one. You were going to ask that one? That's been killing me too.

Really? Where the Max came from. The Max came from one of our earliest meetings in Central Park and we were going to throw a softball together and I was to meet him on 72nd Street and 5th Avenue

and I was about five minutes late or something and I saw him from about a block away and I yelled, Woody, Woody, and when I got up to him he said to me very seriously said listen you mustn't ever call me Woody in public and I said really why why not he said because people will know it's me and they'll look at me and then you know it'll be it'll be embarrassing I said oh I said

maybe they'll look at you because you're wearing an army field jacket practically a helmet on Madison Avenue in one of the ritziest neighborhoods in the city. I said, Jeff, maybe that's why they're looking at you. He said, I don't care about that. He said, just don't call me Woody in public. I said, all right, all right. I said, I'll call you something else. I said, I'll call you Max. He said, fine.

So I called him Max for about the next three or four months. I called him Max. And then one day my phone rang. and I picked up my phone at home, and it was his voice, and he said, hello, Max. And I had a strange moment of thinking, I'm supposed to call him Max. I call him Max. He's just not supposed to call me Max. But rather than stop and analyze it, I just accepted it,

and I said something back like, yes, Max. And who knew that he would ever write that into the script of Annie Hall? But when I got the script, there it was. It was Max. He was Max. There was this Max thing going back and forth. And I think it was so brilliant of him because it makes it true. It makes the friendship true because everybody who's got a close friend has a nickname for him and they have one for him.

And it's kind of a sign of a historical development of these two people, whoever they are. Max, my server's going to send you to the showers early. Right, right. So to get back to what we're discussing, the failure of the country to get behind New York City is anti-Semitism. Max, the city is terribly run. But I'm not discussing politics or economics. This is foreskin. No, no, no, Max. That's a very convenient out. Every time some group disagrees with you, it's because of anti-Semitism.

Don't you see the rest of the country looks upon New York like we're left-wing communist jewish homosexual pornographers i think of us that way sometimes and i live here max if we lived in california we could play outdoors every day in the sun sun is bad for you everything our parents said was good is bad sun milk red meat college you guys are a great tandem in that movie and it that movie. And it's part of the charm of the film. And tell the story. It's in the book, and it's great. The story of the white pullover.

Oh, the white pullover. Well, we were in Los Angeles, and we were wrapping up the shooting there. And I was contacted by the wardrobe department, and they said, we need something for you to wear in the scene with the car that's coming up tomorrow or something like that. they said, we need something for you to wear in the scene with the car that's coming up tomorrow or something like that. He said, we need to go shopping.

I said, okay. So we went shopping, me and the costume lady, and we went into, I think it was Ralph Lauren. And I'm looking over at the racks, and I see this ridiculous white garment with a green visor on it that looks absurd. Who is that? It's not going to keep you warm. It's not going to keep you warm. What is this for? And I said to the woman, I said, could we get this just as a gag? I said, we can return it. Sometimes it was like $450 or something

ridiculous. Today it would probably be $1,500. She said, OK, we can get it as a joke, but we're going to return it after the joke is over. I okay and she picks out some other things so we come to the scene the next day and I very carefully hide that white garment from him so that it'll be a shock and I know it's going to waste a take but I figure it's worth it I can play this gag on him and we get into the scene and start walking down the hill and we get into the car and towards as we get to the end line, I flip the visor down. There's a green thing over me, and he looks over, and I thought that would be the end of it. You know, he'd laugh, and we'd cut, and we'd throw that away,

and we'd go back and do it for real. But he said, without missing a beat, he turned to me, and he said, are we driving through plutonium, Max? And I knew the camera was still rolling, and I don't know where it came from but thank God it came from someplace I said it keeps out the beta rays

you don't get old that's it and then everybody fell out and he liked it and he said okay we got to do one more for protection because they always have to do one for protection in case the camera screwed up and I said do you want me to do the same thing? He said, I want you to do exactly the same thing.

And this time he said, when I pulled the visor down, are we driving through a field of bees? And I don't even remember which one is still in the— It's plutonium. Is it plutonium? Yeah, yeah. Well, anyway, he had another line just in case that line didn't work. But that's the story. There's also the great stuff

where you're talking about, he's saying you're an actor, you should be doing Shakespeare in the park. It's just the banter is great. Well, he said to me after the film was over, he said, you know, people like our schmoozing. He said, I'm finding a couple of screenings and he said they like our interaction, our schmoozing. And then he would say to me, are you doing anything in two months or three months or something? And I'd say yes or no. And he'd say, well, don't do anything until you check with me, because I think I have something for you. So that's how I came to be in, I guess it's six films. Yeah. Yeah. And you work with George Burns. Yes. What a pleasure that was. That was wonderful. He only worked two hours a day, but usually with a martini in his hand

and a cigar in the other hand. And he was as sweet and kind and gentle. We were standing together once and the director said after a take, he said, George, I'm sorry, but we have to do it again. The camera had a problem. And the director walked away and George turned to me and under his breath, he said, I'm 92 and the camera has a problem. He was a wonderful man, wonderful guy. I was so lucky to work with him. Yeah. When you made Radio Days and when you saw the finished product and your part is small, but it must have resonated with you being given your background. Well, to tell you the truth, when I saw Radio Days, I regretted the way they combed my hair, to be honest with you.

Things an actor thinks about. That's right. Yeah, right. I said, oh no, I never wanted my hair to look like that. But, you know, you don't have all that much to say about it under certain circumstances. And in this case, they wanted to make it look like the period and like what they saw that character looking like. Anyway, why did Neil Simon want you to make you straighten your hair for to follow? follow Redford? Ah, because in 1964, which is when this was, people were sensitive to

the ethnic origins of the characters in their plays. And Neil Simon and Arnold St. Suber, who produced it, and Mike Nichols, who directed it and whatnot, had the idea that the people, the Bratters, Paul Bratter and his wife,

Corrie Bratter, were not Jewish. And you wouldn't presume they would be. And they didn't want that to be the story of a Jewish family. And my hair was curly. My nickname in high school was Brillo Pad. And so I looked Jewish compared to Robert Redford. And they said, we'd like you to straighten your hair. And I wasn't able to argue and didn't think I really should. So I went and had my hair straightened. I used to have to have it done just about once a month.

And it was very painful. I had it done on 47th Street and Broadway. I was the only white person in the entire salon. And they put this white, thick cream in my hair and let it sit there until I begged for mercy. And then they would wash it out and your hair was as straight as a broom. And that's the way it stayed until the new hair grew in. Actually, I'm very lucky the new hair did grow in

because there are stories about people having done this over a period of time and damaged their hair permanently. And it was all afraid of that. They think you were Jewish. It was because they didn't want the play to reflect a Jewish sensibility. reflect a neutral sensibility that was acceptable to the audiences who were Gentiles and who were Jews and who were whatever they happened to be. And they were not after what Clifford Odets was after. That just was the commercial theater at that time was not about defining people by their religion or their ethnicity. That's all.

That's simple. Interesting. Times have changed. Yes, exactly. For the better. Exactly. Yeah. And that was a career break, fair to say, barefoot in the park.

Oh, definitely. Yeah. Definitely. You'd been doing soaps. You'd been doing odd jobs and things. I'd done four or five Broadway plays before that. But they had either closed or I was in them briefly because I left to do something else. But I hadn't starred in anything.

I hadn't been above the title in anything. And I was watching the Broadway Show League softball game, which happened every Thursday in Central Park. And the guy who was the understudy to Robert Redford got up at the plate. He was supposed to replace Redford when Redford went on vacation, which was coming up. And I was hired to be his understudy. And as I was sitting in the bleachers, he hit a ball, the understudy did, and he tried to stretch a single into a double, and he broke his ankle sliding into second base.

And everybody got up out of the bleachers to go running out and see if he was all right. And I sat there immobile and thought, holy smoke, this poor guy who just broke his ankle has given me my big break. Kind of ironic. Yeah. But it was because I turned out to go on for Redford when he went on vacation, and they liked what I did.

So when he left permanently a few months later, I was awarded the part. So literally his bad break was my big break. And it's weird how things take shape. Maybe if you're not in that show, maybe you don't meet Woody under those circumstances. That's right. Obviously not. That's right. That's the way it goes.

That's the way it goes. It's a business of tremendous luck and coincidence. Your book is very much about that. It's very much about looking for work and the process of being an actor. about looking for work and the process of being an actor. Well, if you knock on five doors, you've got a certain percentage of odds that somebody's going to open it. If you knock on 50 doors, you got a better shot. And that was the theory behind my approach to the career was to go after everything.

And at some point, you know, you do start to select a little. I mean, you get to be a certain visibility. And they say to you, would you like to be the host of a game show for CBS? You can make this amount of money. And at that point, you have to say no, because then I'll be a game show host. Were you asked to be a game show host? Oh, yeah. Oh, for sure. You were a good game show contestant in the 70s. I remember you.

I remember you all. I was on a lot of game shows. I remember you on game shows. But I was never a regular. I was on two episodes of What's My Line in a Season or To Tell the Truth, Hollywood Squares, that sort of thing. But I never wanted to become identified with being the host of a game show. And I wanted to ask you about this arsenic and old lace with Abe Vigoda and William Hickey. Your old teacher, William Hickey.

That's right, William Hickey. They were a marvelous couple. They shared a dressing room, and everybody went up there for laughs because they were so ridiculous together. So Abe was playing complete opposite characters and personalities and size. They were absurd to look at. And everybody would go hang out in the doorway of their dressing room just to hear them talk to each other, which was always with a tremendous amount of irritation and frustration. But they were an act in the theater by themselves. They were terrific. Hickey was playing Einstein, Dr. Einstein, the Dear Laurie part from the movie,

and assumedly Abe was playing Jonathan. Yes, Abe was playing Boris Karloff. Right. Seemed like they were like Smith and Dale or something. Like that, like that, like that. That was a wonderful company. There were a lot of people in it and we would all have to sit backstage in a semicircle behind the set because everybody had different entrances to make. So there wasn't enough time to go back to your dressing room and hang out. You sat on the stage but hidden from the audience by the set. And I had a dog, my dog Dexter, who was a golden retriever, who I would bring to the theater and who knew never to go on stage. He would only go as far as the wings, but he would hang around in the wings. And he once, in front of the company, during a performance, tried to push the tennis ball that he liked to go fetch for everybody to the dead corpse that was lying there.

He liked to go fetch for everybody. To the dead corpse that was lying there. And we couldn't control ourselves because how stupid can you be if you're a dog not to know that you're trying to play ball with a dead corpse, with someone who never even was alive. It's just a body stuffed with cotton and looking like a person. And Dexter just wouldn't give up. It was the funniest thing he ever went through. Did Hickey play Einstein the whole run?

Because I think Larry Storch was in that production at one point. Gee, let me think about that. Think, if I'm not mistaken. I wouldn't dispute you, but I don't. Maybe you don't know. You could be right. Yeah. I'm so sorry. That's okay.

That's okay. But since you're telling funny... I remember in the TV production Jack Guilford played Einstein. Really? I know Storch did it with Abe Vigoda. I don't know if it was on stage or if it was in some other production.

And was Abe Vigoda in the TV one? I can't remember. I've got to find that out. But, you know, speaking of funny stories of stuff that happens on stage, the Dudley Moore story, when you go to the – you have a lot of funny stories about what happens to actors who are in long runs. I don't have to read my memoir again now that I'm here. This is amazing.

You know, I was going to say, there were so many versions of the thing that I wrote, and I took so many things out along the way that I really recently said, you know, I don't know what's in there. Maybe I should read it before, but I don't have to now. Now you do. Because you reminded me. Yeah. The story of you going, there's a couple of funny stories about long runs.

Actors. Well, after Play It Again Sam closed, didn't close, I left it in New York to go do Promises Promises in London. And one night when we were still in rehearsals in London for Promises and it hadn't opened yet, Merrick invited me to the opening of the London production of Play It Again Sam. And I said, sure, great, I'll go. And I was seated in the second row of the balcony right behind David Merrick and Binky Beaumont, the David Merrick of London at the time. Binky Beaumont.

Binky Beaumont. Binky Beaumont was as famous as any producer ever was in London. And there I am sitting in back of these two guys on opening night. And the curtain goes up. And I say to myself, something's wrong on stage. There's something wrong. What is it? And what I did and discovered that it was

was that the telephone, which was the source of so many laughs for my character who left his phone number everywhere. This was before iPhones, before anything, before anybody could carry a phone around. So people would leave their phone number with people. So I would get on the phone. I'd say, listen, I'm going to be at 212-517-7901. And for the next two hours, then I'll be at 639-784-4333. And then for 20 minutes, I'll be at 637-513-7901. And I had a big laugh.

Okay. So the curtain goes up on opening night. I played against Sam in London. And there's no phone on stage. It's been forgotten. And I know what's going to happen like a train wreck. And there's nothing I can do to stop it. I leaned forward a little bit and I whispered to these guys, there's no phone. There's no phone. They didn't know what the hell I was talking about. What do you mean there's no phone? And sure enough, the guy playing my character comes on stage with my wife and he goes right to the phone. And of course, it's not there. So what then happens is that he goes off stage in one direction to find a phone. And the woman playing my wife goes off through another door.

I don't even think it was a door. She went through a door that was just an entrance for people to come in later when they were ghosts or something like that. So she just went through the wall. I mean, it didn't make any sense to anybody. She was here a moment ago, and now she's gone. How did she leave? And she says from offstage, I've got one. And I hear the other guy, me playing.

He says, no, there's one in here. And suddenly they show up with two phones. Neither of which, of course, is plugged plugged into anything but it didn't matter they they got themselves together and the play went forward but i thought i'm the only person in the world who could have ever been in this situation i see this terrible thing coming and nobody knows it but me that's how are they going to figure it out i always check my props i always yeah that's fun and then how are they going to figure it out? I always check my props. I always check my props. Yeah, that's fun. And then you did, there's a Kay Medford story too, when you did Don't Drink the Water.

Kay Medford. You were goofing on her. Yes, you know, when you're in a long run, people make up jokes and it's a Wednesday matinee and you've been doing it for three or four months and you're crazy about the person you're acting with. And so you give them an extra wink or you do something that is intended to make them know they're there. And Kay Medford saw that I was trying to distract her in a childish way and did me one better and just walked right over to me in front of the audience and everything and took me by the elbow. And as she continued saying her line, which she said perfectly, she walked me right into the wings.

She took me right off stage. And suddenly I wasn't finished. I had another three pages. And I found myself in the wings. And she, of course, turned around and went back on stage. And I now had to make a second entrance into the scene I already had been in. You had it coming, Tony. I never fooled around with her again after that.

You had it coming. She one-upped me. She sure did. She was fearless. You worked with—also Lou Jacoby was in that production. Anything you remember about him? What—Paul Schaefer's favorite. Oh, yeah. Lou Jacoby. Did you like Lou? He was in that production. Anything you remember about him? Paul Schaefer's favorite. Oh, yeah.

Lou Jacoby. Did you like Lou? He's hysterical. He was great. We loved him. He was divine. I'm on the Dean Martin Variety Show. Yeah, all right.

With Kay Medford. Uh-huh. Well, he was great fun. And he was also with, speaking of Woody Allen, I think he was in- He's in everything you always wanted to know about sex. That's right. That's right. But Woody, Lou, Lou would always have to say things in his, in the way that he could understand

them. So Woody would say, Lou, on that line, I want you to cross to the table and, and, and just cross to the table on that line. And instead of just doing it, Lou would always say, oh, oh, oh, I got it. So in other words, in other words, Woody, you want me to cross to the table? And the rest of us would stand around and say, well, of course, that's what he said. And that was every time he got a direction, he would take a long pause, and then he would read.

In other words, you want me to pick up the glass at the end of the line? Yes. Yes. That's what he said. What a lovable character. He was, except that he was an artist and he used to like to paint things. And then he'd put his paintings up in the hallway off the main stage, off the stage. And he used some kind of fixative that had the most terrible odor,

and it made everybody a little nauseous. And we all were complaining about it. We said, we can't breathe on stage because of this fixative that's attached to these pictures that are on the walls. And it made nobody cough more than Lou. But Lou would cough when he was in the wings, and you'd hear it on stage.

And, you know, he was always on your verb. You know, you'd hear at least if you heard a person cough from the audience on your verb, there's nothing you can do about it. But when it's a cast member who coughs on your verb from the wings, you know, and he didn't do it maliciously. But it just happened. You say, oh, God, I lost another laugh because Lou coughed in the wind. I'm looking at names of people you worked with over the years. Robert Morse, anything funny about making sugar with Robert Morse, which was some like it hot. Yes, it was some like it hot.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, Bobby was brilliant, and we had dresses to wear. We had a three-hour makeup session to make us look like women. And I remember my thinking I looked just like my mother after they'd finished. And we had a lot of laughs about the earrings and the high heels and all that kind of stuff. He's a big talent, Robert Morse. Oh, we love him. What was it like working with Julie Andrews and Blake Edwards? Well, they were great. The kind of stuff. He's a big talent, Robert Morse. Huge, yes. Oh, we love him. What was it like working with Julie Andrews and Blake Edwards?

Well, they were great. Speaking of legends. Two legends, absolutely, two legends. I remember flying on a plane with them in a snow blizzard to get from Minneapolis to Chicago to help promote it before it opened. And we got to the airport. All the regular flights were canceled. There was nothing.

And there was this silly little tiny plane that Blake and Julie and I were supposed to get in. And there was a guy on the runway with a broom sweeping the snow away from the wheels. And I said, are we really going to die for a musical comedy? Is it really worth it? And they didn't think twice about it. I must say they were fearless. And I thought once I got on the plane, I thought, I'm all right. I'm flying with the Mary Poppins.

What can happen to me? And we got to Chicago. We made it. We didn't get killed until we got to New York. There's a part in the book where you're talking about where you say you say to edwards i think that gag is a little on the cheap side oh god yes and he says to you he says to me he said cheap he said i made a living making i he said i got i'm a i'm a millionaire by making cheap he said i got rich i got rich by being cheap something very confessional on his part, which I was surprised to hear him say,

but he knew what... He was a craftsman of the joke, of the slapstick joke, although he would spend hours just working out exactly who should enter at what moment and how the banana peel gets revealed, you know, and just calculating it to the last degree.

You look at those Panther films now in The Great Race and some of those things, and we've talked about this on the show and how meticulously you know that you know what you're watching. You know that these things were storyboarded and rehearsed. Absolutely. And mapped out to the nth degree. That's right. Because he was and he was obviously a lover of silent comedy. Yes, completely. But you don't see that anymore.

It's almost like a bygone form of a film comedy. Yes, absolutely right. Absolutely right. Sometimes painstaking to go through because he was so precise about it. But, you know, he'd never really directed in the theater. Right. And when the first day of rehearsal, there were like the cast of about 50 people

sitting in a big room someplace to rehearse. And he came into the room, a large rehearsal room, and he said, well, where's the set? And they said, well, we don't have the set yet, Mr. Edwards. The set is being built in Boston or Chicago or wherever it was we were working. Minneapolis maybe was the first place we opened. He said, you mean I don't, I have four weeks of rehearsal without a set? And of course that's standard operating procedure in the theater. You don't see the set until after

you've rehearsed for four weeks usually. And then you go out of town, you find the set or you move to the theater and you see the set and you start working on the set. And he, on a film set in Hollywood, if he didn't like the set, it would take two hours. They'd build another set. They had something in the warehouse down the street that they could put in in a minute. And he could redirect. So he said, well, I don't know what to do without any set. And he sent everybody home, which was, you know, unheard of because it's like an hourglass when you start rehearsals, you know, every, every hour is wasted that you're not doing something that gets you closer to

opening night. So this was a very unorthodox of him, but suddenly everybody went home at 10 o'clock in the morning because there was no set. And then they obviously made it clear to him that he was going to have to do this with the usual tape marks on the floor, which had been laid out very extensively where the doors were, where the staircase would begin, where the window, you know, the markings. So everybody has something to relate to because you haven't got the real things there. Everybody has something to relate to because you haven't got the real things there. Now, you worked with both Richard Kiley and Jose Ferrer, both terrific actors. Do you have any memories you could share?

Oh, gosh, of course. I don't know which ones to pull out first. Jose was fun because Jose, who was a big star and who did everything and who had played every role under the sun in the movies, on the stage and everything like that, would go around to the lunch tables when we were shooting Midsummer Night's Sex Comedy. big, like a coffin almost, and he would scrape all the food that nobody had eaten into this tray and put it in the back of his car and take it home and freeze it for the winter. I said, what are you doing, Jose? He said, you don't know what it's like to be out of work. Jose Ferrer is taking the lunch food home to freeze to get through the winter, but everybody has their eccentricities.

That sounds strangely familiar. Oh, yes. Why are you looking in his direction? Is that what you do, Gilbert? Yeah. I was going to say, there are some people even after years of success. But you're making millions of dollars on this blog. Of course he is. Oh, yes. I'll going to say, there are some people even after years of success. But you're making millions of dollars on this blog. Of course he is.

Oh, yes. I was going to speak to you about this. Yeah, the big money is in podcasts. That's what I came here to find out. There's stories in the book, too, about you working. I mean, showbiz legends, George Abbott, Harold Prince, Gower Champion, Merrick, you talked about. And Jerome Robbins, who sounds like quite a character. Oh, boy.

Well, there are endless stories about Jerome Robbins. Jerome Robbins was talking to the cast of Jerome Robbins Broadway, apparently, at some point, which was about 60 dancers. This was before I got there. And they watched him yelling at them and backing up and no one said jerry you're two feet from the lip of the stage you're going to be in the orchestra pit in a minute and he was and he landed in the orchestra pit he fell into a drum or something like that and he was still hollering at them from the pit after he'd fallen. He was still. He said to me once, he said, I notice you're standing stage center. He said, don't stand stage center.

He said, that's a terrible place to be. He said, there's no conflict. There's no it's better if you if you stand two feet to the left or further away. There's some tension. There's some energy going back. He said, but stage center is the worst place you could possibly be. He said energy going back he said but stage center is the worst place you could possibly be he said who told you to stand stage center and i said you did yesterday which he had which he had and he liked me so he didn't um take offense and he

said oh well uh it's a bad idea. Don't do it. Stand over there. But he was very kind to me. He was very a different man when he was in the theater than what he was walking around on the streets or at an affair or a party when he was

as marvelous as your favorite uncle could be. Gentle and kind and concerned. You meet him in the street. But once inside that theater, he was rough. He had no patience for anybody who wasn't doing something that was in his head that they should be doing.

From the piano players to the conductors to the dancers to the stage managers. He brought more people to tears than Sam Levine who brought many people to tears in my early days when I was in a play with him.

Do you still remember the speech from the Olivier speech? The Olivier speech? From Henry V. Oh. Can you still do it? Am I putting you on the spot? Just give me the first word. I don't have it written yet. Oh, well, I said four score and seven. No, that's not it. This day is called the Feast of Crispin. He that lives this day and sees old age will yearly on the vigil feast his friends and say, Tomorrow is St. Crispin. Then will he strip his sleeve and show his scars and say,

These wounds I had on Crispin's day. Old men forget, yet all shall be forgot, but he'll remember with advantages what feats he did that day. Then shall our names familiar in his mouth as household words, Harry the King, Wolfer and Orcs, be in their cups freshly remembered. And this day shall not go by from this day to the ending of the world, but we in it shall be remembered. We few, we happy few, we band of brothers, for he today who sheds his blood with me shall be my brother, be he ne'er so something, something that fought with us upon St. Crispin's Day. Fantastic.

Wow. How old were you when you memorized that? Probably about eight. Yeah. That's amazing. Well, they took me to see the movie. That's amazing. And I hated the movie.

I was so bored. I was walking around the aisles. I couldn't understand anything. And then they broadcast the soundtrack see the movie. That's amazing. And I hated the movie. I was so bored. I was walking around the aisles. I couldn't understand anything. And then they broadcast the soundtrack of the movie on the radio. And on the radio, you could hear not only this great film score by one of those whose name I can't remember again. We'll say Miklos Rosa. It wasn't Miklos Rosa because I know every note Miklos Rosa ever wrote. Ernest Gold.

No, it was one of the English guys. Okay. You know, sir, something, some William Walton. That's who it was. It was William Walton. See, fellas? Give him a moment. I can't remember anything.

And, but what you could hear on the radio were the sounds of the arrows going through the air during the battle scenes. It was written into the orchestrations, and that was astonishing to me because there I am sitting on the rug in my bedroom, and I can see these arrows because I hear them, and that's when I started to memorize that speech. He said, well, you were a New York kid, which we didn't even point out at the top. You fell in love with movies. You used to pretend to be shot at the top of the staircase

at the 86th Street Theater. Yes. And he's a Million Dollar Movie fan. Oh, my God. Something else that we've talked about to death on this show. The Million Dollar Movie got you to a deeper appreciation of all the movies because you could see them. Actually, I think they paid them twice a night for six nights or seven nights.

So my friends and I all prided ourselves on being able to quote the most lines from whatever the movie was, Red River or High Noon or whatever. But we would trade lines to each other to see who could remember the most dialogue. But there was something valuable about that. Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. Now I'm going to tell a quick Tony Roberts story. Oh.

Something that happened to me. This is about how distinct Tony's voice is. When I moved back to New York from Los Angeles, and I was in an apartment, just taking an apartment on 81st Street, and I just got the phone installed that day and I called my dad and the phone lines were crossed. And there was another voice. There was another conversation on the line. This is a true story. And I was talking to my dad and I said to my dad, I said, pause a minute, pause a minute. And then I said, excuse me.

And you could hear, the other voice could hear me. And I said, now this is crazy. I said, this sounds like the actor Tony Roberts is on the phone. And there was a pause. And then you said, that's because this is Tony Roberts. Amazing. And you were on the party line. And my father, who's hard of hearing at this point, said, who's Tony Rogers?

Did you ever think that maybe it wasn't Tony Roberts? I mean, it might have been somebody else saying they were Tony Rogers. And then you said, fellas, I'm in the middle of a phone call. Could you hang up and redial? And I did. And I said, my wife said, if you ever meet Tony Roberts, you're going to have to tell him that story. That's very funny. It actually happened.

That's funny. Yeah. It makes me remember my dad in a funny way, too. So what are you up to now, Tony? You're doing a lot of voiceovers. You're reading a lot of books. Thank God. I'm still doing audio books, and I do many of them by Stuart Woods, who's a very successful writer of pulp fiction.

By Stuart Woods, who's a very successful writer of pulp fiction. And I played a character named Stone Barrington, who's a kind of amalgam of Sam Spade and Philip Marlowe and that type of guy. And I've done 35 books over the last 20 years by Stuart Woods playing Stone Barrington and all the other characters in the book, usually about 35 different voices and different people. And it takes about two days of eight hours a day of me sitting in a small little recording booth. And I love it so. I cannot tell you what joy there is in doing that. And we laugh. There's an engineer, there's a producer, and there's me.

And that's it. And when I come out of that studio, I don't know which way to turn when I leave the building. I've been in my head for so long in such a focused way. And when you read something like The Maltese Falcon, do you do voices? Do you try to do the voices from don't try to do the voices from the, you throw a little Sidney Greenstreet in there? Morty's Falcon is unique because how many books could you read that are as iconic as that or that I've seen as many times as that, and it so happens I've always done a very good Sidney Greenstreet.

I bring it up because Gilbert does a pretty fair Sidney Greenstreet. Do you really? Yes, sir. Yes. I like talking to a man who likes to talk. I just close my eyes. Very good. I wouldn't even try to compete with you.

You're a man after my own heart. There's only one blackbird. You can always get another Wilma, but there's only one blackbird. 17 and 17 15th percent. I love his voice. Beautiful. Oh, yes. But, yes, Maltese Walk and I tried.

I didn't want to go that far and pretend to be those guys. No, it's you who ruined it. You and your stupid attempt to bat. Kevin found out how valuable it was. Gilbert Gott stupid attempt to buy it. Kevin found out how valuable it was. Gilbert Gottfried, ladies and gentlemen. The best Peter Lorre ever been done.

It's a great Peter Lorre. Oh, that's wonderful. That's good. We should do a scene together. Oh, yes. When you come back, we'll do some Maltese Falcon dialogue. We'll have you guys do an actual scene. You want to talk about Dirty Dancing?

Oh, I would like to mention Dirty Dancing. Not that it's going to mean anything in my pocketbook. Selling my book would help me. And you've already told everybody what's in it. It's the name of the book. Do You Know Me? It's available now on Amazon and at Barnes & Noble. Do You Know Me.

Anyway, you asked about what else. Dirty Dancing has been remade, the famous iconic film from 1987, about 1963 and the Catskills, and the coming of age of a young woman played originally by Jennifer Grey, now played by Abigail Breslin, was made last April and will be shown during Sweep Weeks

May 24th, I think, is the broadcast night, and it's a big three-hour musical with new music, old music, marvelous dancing by Andy Blankenbuehler, who did Hamilton. And I haven't seen it, but I have high hopes that it comes close to being as good as the original, which was kind of a good film, I recall. It was. So that's what I have to sell, my film and my book. And that's it, fellas. The book is fun.

The book has got a lot of fun. There are a lot of anecdotes, but it's also about the life of an actor. I didn't know what it was going to be about. It took about 12 years to put it together because I kept throwing versions of it away. You know, I thought, I'm going to tell the truth about everybody, and I'll put this one into the right place and I'll do that. I said, wait a minute, wait a minute, you don't want to do that. So I took a lot of stuff out, and then he said,

well, should I talk about the girls? Should I talk about the girls? No, not going to talk about the girls. This led to it not being published. This led to it not being published. And I published it myself to avoid having to talk about the kinds of things that publishers would have wanted me to get into, which I didn't feel comfortable. There are plenty of good stories in there. Thank you. Thank you.

I appreciate it. Al Viner would be proud. And we should thank Richard Kine, too, who introduced us to Tony and made this happen. Yes, Richard called to tell me I had to do this blog, and I said, of course I'm going to do this blog, Richard. I said, you think I wouldn't do a blog?

Of course I'll do a blog. And another thing Richard Kine is known for is when it comes to being a schnorrer, everyone says, he's got me beat. I'm strictly in the amateur leagues. Tony, thanks for doing this. Thank you, fellas.

I appreciate it. Before you go, you have to do your line about the triplets. I think it was in Annie Hall. Oh. It's twins. It's twins. My God, triplets. Gilbert, you give me too much credit.

Yes. Triplets. I never even dreamt of triplets. Yes, I think he's discovered, oh, I have to bail him out of jail. That's what it is. And I was interrupted because I was carrying on with twins, Max. Twins. 16-year-olds. You have any idea of the mathematical possibilities of that? I think that's what it was. Well, Gilbert, I'll never work again, but thanks so much. I grew up saying that line to my son.

You did? My son's name is Max, and I used to say, Max, Max. You do Tony Roberts impressions in the house to your son? Yeah, yeah. Fantastic. Yeah, like infants really appreciate it. Yeah, sure. Well, you've got infants really appreciate it. Yeah, sure. Well, you've got to find a guy named Dave Juskow who's a comic in New York

who does the Tony Roberts impression. Really? Yeah, he does the seminal Tony Roberts impression. Oh. Maybe we'll have you back for a mini episode and we'll have you and Dave do dueling Tony Roberts. You've got me. You've got me.

I'll be here. All right, Gilbert. I'm Gilbert Gottfried. This has been Gilbert Gottfried's Amazing Colossal Podcast with my co-host, Frank Santopadre, and our wonderful guest, Max himself, Tony Roberts. Thank you, Gilbert. Thank you, Tony. This was fun.

Thank you so much. Thank you, Gilbert. Thank you, Tony. This was fun. Thank you so much. Once again, we'd like to thank our sponsors, BullGooseShaving.com. Get the closest, most comfortable shave you've ever experienced with Bull Goose Shaving Supplies. Whether you need a new safety razor, shaving brush, or shaving software, Bull Goose has you covered.

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