Gilbert Gottfried's Amazing Colossal Podcast - 230. Peter Bonerz

Episode Date: October 22, 2018

Actor and director Peter Bonerz shares his views on the state of television comedy, the pros and cons of laugh tracks and the rights and wrongs of improvisational theater and looks back on his decades-long friendships with Bob Newhart and Suzanne Pleshette. Also, Redd Foxx changes his tune, Carroll O'Connor cashes a check, Woody Allen brings down the house and Peter directs Gilbert in an episode of "Wings." PLUS: Rod Serling! Captain Kangaroo! The wit and wisdom of Buck Henry! Murphy Brown meets Walter Cronkite! And Peter remembers the late, great Bill Daily! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

At Mila, our partner is the planet. Until June 30th, every Mila dishwasher purchased supports the planting and preservation of Canadian forests through the Mila Forest Initiative. Join us in making an impact today for a better tomorrow. Visit mila.ca to learn more. That's the sound of unaged whiskey transforming into Jack Daniel's Tennessee Whiskey in Lynchburg, Tennessee. 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, I'm Mick Garris, and I'm with Gilbert Gottfried, and this is Gilbert Gottfried's amazing, colossal podcast with my co-host, Frank Santopadre. a award-winning director of feature films, TV movies, hundreds of hours of network television. As an actor, you've seen him in movies like Fuzz, Funny Man, Medium Cool, Whatever Happened to Aunt Alice, Catch-22, Serial, and Man on the Moon And in the popular TV series The Addams Family Sanford and Son

9 to 5 Murder, She Wrote Home Improvement And Parks and Recreation But he's perhaps best known to audiences For playing the sarcastic dentist, Jerry Robinson, Barb Hartley's friend and office mate on one of the most beloved situation comedies of all time,

The Bob Newhart Show. In a performing career spanning seven decades, he shared the big and small screen with Peter Ustinov, Orson Welles, Christopher Lee, Hal Linden, Chuck McCann, and Carl Reiner. As a director, he's helmed popular and critically acclaimed television shows such as The Mary Tyler Moore Show, Friends, News Radio, Wings, Just Shoot Me, and Murphy Brown, and worked with dozens of our favorite stars, including William Shatner, George Segal, Betty White, Tony Randall, and Jack Klugman, and even a brilliant performer known as Gilbert Gottfried. Please welcome to the show a man of multiple talents and the only guest we know of who

played another one of our guests, Peter Bonners. Hello. Peter, how are you? I'm just fine. We're so glad you slept, even though it was only ten minutes. It was ten minutes from my doorstep, so it wasn't much of a drive. Do you remember directing this man? Yes, I do. What was the show? So, I think it was two shows. There was Wings. Oh, yes. You know, on the drive over,

I was preparing by saying, Gilbert Gottfried, yes. What show was that? And Wings was the first one that popped into my head. But, you know, I have an 80-year-old head, so I can't trust it anymore. Wings and the other one? Hope and Gloria. Ah, Hope and Gloria. That was a short, lived show. Oh, yes. And I remember it was Alan Thicke, Cynthia Stevenson, Jessica Lund, and Erica, oh, Enrico Colantoni.

Enrico Colantoni. What a wonderful actor. Oh, he was terrific. He probably still is. I haven't seen him for a while. Oh, I had so much fun with him. Yeah, he was great. And then I worked with him again, I think, on Just Shoot Me. Gilbert was in the episode Say Uncle Carlton, where he was Bill Hickey's nephew or grandson? Yeah, his grandson. Bill Hickey, another great actor. There's a name. I actually studied acting with Bill Hickey in New York. Wow.

Oh, no kidding. At Herbert Berkow Studio. Yeah, he taught there forever. Oh, he was a wonderful actor and a terrific acting coach. Very good teacher. Yeah, memories of Bill Hickey? A very strange fellow. Yes, very odd guy.

Well, he was severely alcoholic. Oh. By the time we got to work with him, no, no, by the time we got to work with him, he was really only 30% on the set. Yeah, I remember. What was funny,

it was one of those almost cliched things. He would be walking there and he looked like the living dead. Yeah. I thought he was going to drop dead any second. And yet he was one of those people. He yelled action and he did it. You know, there's a thing in the theater,

doctor theater, a person can be sick or abusing any number of substances, sick or abusing any number of substances. And when they call action or when the French stage director goes thunk, thunk, thunk on the floor or when the curtain opens, they're there. And they're there for the necessary 30 seconds on camera or three hours on stage. And then they collapse. It's a curious thing it's i guess it's adrenaline but uh doctor theater yep yeah i think i worked with shirley hempel and i experienced

the same same thing she was i could name names of people that i worked okay now you but I won't. You gave me a piece of direction once. Uh-oh. Where you said, okay, let's do another take and act better. Perfect. Exactly. I can't tell you how many real big shots I've given that same simple direction to. Because if a person's a professional, that's all they need. They say, okay, I can act better than that.

If they're not a professional, they get very confused and sometimes angry. But I've given that direction to Bill Shatner, to Candice Bergen, to Bob Newhart, to Suzanne Plachette, to Peter Cook, any number of really good pros. And it works. You could probably give that to athletes, too. Oh, I'm sure. Pick up your game a little bit. Act better. You might be able to give that direction to Donald Trump, but because he's so poor at what he does, he would merely get angry. What do you mean better?

I'm the best I can be all the time. Yeah, well, that's sociopaths for you. After I completed that episode of Wings, I was doing a voiceover and I ran into one of your old co-stars, Marsha Wallace. Oh, great. And I said, oh, I just got directed by someone you know, Peter Bonners. And she looked at me and said, and what did he tell you to do? Act better? There you go. Well, that means that I had undying respect for both you and Marsha's acting ability.

Love it. And, well, I heard a story like Michael Douglas. Oliver Stone said to him at one point he said are you on drugs or anything and he said no he goes are you okay and he said what do you think of the performance you've been giving and michael douglas said i i thought it is pretty good. And that was what he needed. No, no, we want more than pretty good. Exactly so. So be a little better.

Yeah. Well, now I'm curious because the second time, was it the first or second time? Because in Hope and Glory, you were actually playing yourself. So if you got that direction, that's a sad state of affairs as myself yes oh no see i i could argue and i can argue anything because i'm i'm been schooled by the jesuits jesuits uh i can argue anything and i could argue that the hardest person to act is yourself. Oh, absolutely. So when I was saying act better, I meant try to get a little closer to that person whose name is Gilbert Gottfried.

And that's a hard thing to do because even when you look in the mirror, you don't see yourself. No. You see a polar opposite image. You see a mirror image of yourself. Tell Peter it's interesting what the direction David Steinberg gave you when he was directing you. Oh. That's worse.

Yeah, no, David Steinberg was directing me where I had to say something and then run off the set. And I did it. And Steinberg said, can you run a little faster? And I said, yeah, I could run a little faster. And he said, no, no, I don't want faster necessarily. I want it more graceful.

And I said, graceful? And he said, yeah, you know, less choppy, more evenly. And then finally, I shrugged my shoulders and he threw his hands up in the air and he goes, can you run less Jewish? That's very good. And I knew exactly what he meant by that. Peter, tell us about the early days. You mentioned being schooled by the Jesuits. You were born in New Hampshire.

You grew up in Milwaukee. Oh, you got it all there. It's all written down. It's all written down. It's all written down. Yeah, yeah. And you went into, I saw an interview with you with, I think it was the Television Academy. Yes. Oh, wow.

You were talking about. That was a good interview. A long time. Boy, that was really fun. I really enjoyed that because when people ask you questions, you immediately respond and you call these memories up that you didn't know you had that's what we do every week here and i oh well great good for you i really enjoyed that interview i must say so uh you go on with your question no i'm just going to say we found it interesting you

were you were dealing with a stutter is that what part of what attracted you to acting i think so, yeah. As an only child, I stuttered. And I really stuttered seriously. I had a blocking sort of stuttering. And this is not uncommon for stutterers to stutter on the first initials of their names. And so I stuttered on the P and the B. Oh, interesting. It was terrible. James, and so I stuttered on the P and the B. Oh, interesting. It was terrible, and it really isolated me.

I became socially isolated. Then around fourth grade or so, a nun, I went to a Catholic school, and because I stuttered, I think I was driven to act foolish i had seen danny k in the movies and i had seen the marks brothers and i knew that acting foolish was a good thing because people like them interesting like people who acted silly so i acted silly in class and a nun said peter would you stand up please please? She said, is that what you want to do in life? You just want to be a silly guy? And where most kids would hang, hang their heads in embarrassment, I actually thought about that for a second. I said, well, what's the choice here? Being a stutterer or a silly guy that commands attention. And that stuck with me for about 15 seconds.

And then when I was in high school in speech class, I still stuttered, and a Jesuit said, you know, they say that for people to stutter when they get on stage, they don't stutter because they know what they're going to say. Oh, fascinating. It was a theory that this guy had. Oh, fascinating. It was a theory that this guy had. So I entered the elocution contest by performing a piece I got from watching the Sid Caesar television show, Weirdo Shoes.

It was a monologue about a guy walking down the street and seeing a pair of silly shoes in the window, and he goes in and tries them on and stuff. And it was a pretty funny routine, I memorized it and I did it and I the other contestants at this Jesuit high school were doing soliloquies from Shakespeare and the Gettysburg Address and prayers and all sorts of stuff and I got up there

and did it. This Jewish entertainer in a Jesuit school. And heaven knows I won the contest. Wow. And that said to me, okay, you can do this in front of people now. Then I started to act in plays in high school. Then when I was in college, I acted in plays, and I got a scholarship.

So it really started to snowball there. I figured that this was something that I had a talent for, and they would pay me for it. They gave me a scholarship at Marquette University. Yeah. And then I did some MC work and stuff. You did a little stand-up, too? Oh, yeah, because in those days, that's what you did. I had seen the work of Second City and Mike Nichols, Elaine May,

Shelley Berman, Bob Newhart, of course. And Lenny Bruce was our idol during those years. And I cobbled together, and I was a jazz drummer, so between sets, I would get up and do a set of comedy, which was about five minutes or so. I never had more than 20 minutes in my life. You never had more than 20 minutes of material? No, no, no. Because I can't write where the shit.

So I went to New York. I can't write. And I've tried. shit so i went to new york i can't write and i've tried i mean i've got a a whole warehouse for not a warehouse but a stack of stuff in the garage screenplays i cannot write i'm not stupid and i'm i i know big words and stuff i can't write i just have no so when i went went to new york and started my stand-up career, I was at a place called Upstairs at the Duplex. Oh, sure. Here's who was on stage with me.

Woody Allen, Dick Cavett, Siegel, George, but he sang. Joan Rivers. Dick and Joan, yeah. And then me and Peter Bonners from Milwaukee. Woody would get up there and do three sets a night with different material. Amazing. And I got up once a night and did the same stupid talking Christmas tree. It was embarrassing.

Didn't you have a story? I remember a story now. You had a date with you, and you asked her to evaluate your performance. My wife. Oh, it was your wife. The woman I'm going home to. Your future wife. Roz Bonners, my wife that I met in the fourth grade.

And she came to New York, and she saw me up against Cabot and Woody Allen. And I said, what did you think? And she said, boy, that Cabot was Woody Allen and I said what did you think? And she said boy that Cabot was really funny. But I tell you we're still married. I've known her since I was eight years old. Oh that's romantic. She's honest.

And she's really bright. She reads a lot of books, sees a lot of movies, we go to a lot of books, sees a lot of movies. We go to a lot of theater, a lot of music. So I trust her. Had she said, oh, you were like the other girls that I was dating,

you were really funny. She didn't go there. She gave me the honest evaluation and it's a good thing she did because I, at that point, said maybe I should stop flogging myself here. Those guys are funny.

It's not funny because they're Jewish. Dick Cavett wasn't even Jewish. Sure. You're not going to do this. You do that other thing. You do improvisational theater. You can act a little bit. So I went there.

And do you remember any of the material? Talking Christmas tree. Yeah. Can you do? Can you of the material? Talking Christmas tree. Yeah. Can you do – can you – can you – No. Tree notes. Next. Peter warned us.

No, but I tell you what I would – what I used to do when I ran out of material, when they wanted me to do the second set. Yes. I would do what I called a professor's spot that I stole from Second City, Severin Darden. Oh, the great Severin Darden. Great improvisational actor. And he would get on stage, and in a German accent, I could do a little German accent, and I would ask the audience for an area of expertise. Physics, astronomy, you name it

Biographies of famous people And then I would extemporize a lecture And I had a pretty good education So I could bluff my way through four or five minutes of questions from the audience With a German accent. And that's always funny to begin with because people always laugh at accents. So that's the only thing that I remember that I actually got consistent laughs at or with because they thought I was making it up, and I was because I was desperate.

How did you make the transition into into improv because eventually you joined the premise and yeah yeah one of the reasons that I went to New York from Milwaukee Wisconsin with one suitcase and two hundred dollars uh was that I had seen Second City in 1959 and it it literally turned my life around the way I've heard musicians talk about hearing Charlie Parker or Art Tatum. They just go, what? People are doing that live on the stage night after night? I couldn't believe it. These people were talented.

They were funny. They were touching. This was Paul Sand, Alan Arkin, Barbara Harris, Severin Darden. The list goes on. You know the list. Paul Sills, of course. Yeah. It turned my life around. And Paul Sills became my guru. I've worked with him in story theater and I went to his workshops up in Green Bay, Wisconsin

he was a fabulous person a lot of people I met a woman in the lobby here at the recording studio and she was a member of an improv group the improv people today first of all

we used to call it improvisational theater it had a much much classier ring to it. But they don't even know who Paul Sills was. Yeah, it's a shame. Or his mother, Viola Spallin, who wrote the book, Improvisation for the Theater. Yeah, it's a shame. It all came from her book.

It wasn't Del Close. It was Viola Spallin and her son, Paul Sills. I hope this gets in the podcast. People should know this. Absolutely. Didn't you try to join and you said that Paul threw you out the door? Yeah, I went down there. Physically threw you in the street?

I would go down on weekends to see the show. And one weekend, I finally got up the courage and I went to Paul and I said, look, I'm graduating from college here next semester, and I would like to just throw myself at your feet. I don't expect to be paid or anything. And he said, he looked at me, and he said, I'm busy. He took me. No, I swear this is true he turned me around

looked me in the eye and said I'm very busy here I'm directing this show how old are you? and I said I'm 19 he said

okay here's what you do go back to where? Milwaukee, Wisconsin go back to Milwaukee, Wisconsin finish theater and figure it out for yourself oh wow and he pushed me out it was fabulous Go back to Milwaukee, Wisconsin, finish theater, and figure it out for yourself. Oh, wow.

And he pushed me out of the door. It was fabulous. I could have sucked around that for a long time, you know, just waiting by the door. And I went back to Milwaukee, and we started a little improv group of our own. Right. Did some stand-up. I literally figured it out. Yeah. But that involved coming to New York and joining the premise.

In other words, he said, get out of here, act better. I got you. Now, when did you get your first actual job in showbiz? 1961 at the Premise Theater. Not at the Premise Theater on McDougal and Bleeker. It was in the old basement. In the old basement. Ted Flicker.

Oh, what a wonderful show that was. Ted Flicker. Gilbert and I were just talking about the President's Analyst. They wanted to do a summer show. Oh, what a swell movie. Yeah, Ted Flicker. Yep. Joan Darling, Tommy Aldrich.

Oh, boy. Buck is still living. We had Buck on the show. We had him a couple of months ago. He's one of the funniest people that I've ever met in my life. He is great. Peter Cook, Buck, Henry. Oh, my God.

I could even quote him. Anyway, here I'll give you a Buck Henry quote. We're in, it used to be called Peking. We were in Beijing, China. The second trip over after Jane Fonda. And Buck and I were there, and we saw this interminable opera, one of these Red Women's Brig brigade opera that go on for five hours and it's just about the heroes of the social magical world.

And we're sitting with 35 American tourists and we're bored stiff. And I asked Buck, what's the name of this? And without hesitation, he said, they're doing Moon Over My Army. It was the Red Brigade of Women. Very quick. These beautiful, these beautiful. So I nudged the person next to me and said, Moon Over My Army. And then she nudged the person next to me and said, moon over my army. And then she nudged the person next to her.

So for the next 35 seconds, you heard these Americans going, 35 different laughs. He's a genius. Moon over my army. Anyway, they were doing a show in Westport, Connecticut, and a guy named Zev Putterman, a wonderful director, hired me to go up with Sandy Barron. You remember Sandy Barron? Oh, Sandy Barron, sure. Sandy Barron. We talked about him on this show.

And I and a couple other people. Was James Frawley in that group? No. James Frawley was actually in the New York group. Oh, he's in the New York group. Okay. Westport group with Sandy. Okay.

But that was my first job. Got paid $65 a week in 1961, and I was on my way. This was it. The start of Peter Bonner's in the show business. Got back to New York, waiting to be plugged into the New York show. What do I get in the mail?

Greetings. I was drafted into in the mail? Greetings. I was drafted into His Majesty's United States Army and spent two years of my life in the Army at that very moment when my career could have taken off. Such is my hatred for the military. Thank heaven it was only two years. Yeah, and it was a pretty good two years because I was stationed in Long Island City at what is now the Astoria Studios.

Right. And I worked making training films with the United States Army. Oh, great. That sounds like a cushy heartbeat. And I lived in Manhattan. I lived in Manhattan. Exactly. I lived in... You did the Frank Capra thing. And I lived in Manhattan. I lived in Manhattan. Exactly. He was there.

I lived in Manhattan, took the subway to the Army. That worked out. Lived in Hell's Kitchen, $20 a month. And you said all of your friends would try to outsmart the draft board. Yes. Who told you that? In one of your interviews. Okay, well, I just keep repeating it.

We do research here, Peter. Interview number 12. Yes, most of my show business friends at that time were really clever and knew how to get out of the draft. They could say they were gay. They could say they were drug addicts. They could drink a lot of coffee. The night before, there were any number of things. Dick Cheney, our president at Bonespurs,

any clever guy in my era could get out of the draft. So I was either not clever or I chose not to do that. And I still am not sure. My heroic sense of self tells me that I didn't want to go there. I just didn't want to default on what i knew to be true and ethical in my myself that's giving me far too much credit but that's what i think i thought then oh good for you you had integrity but you were stationed well whatever i called it but you were stationed in Long Island City, so.

Yeah, but I didn't know I was going to be stationed there. Yeah. I went and did basic training in Fort Dix in December. Oh. I still don't like camping because you go out with half a pup tent in the middle of December in New Jersey where it's wet and cold. That's not fun. And I didn't know. The guys around me when we were standing in line after basic training, where are you going?

One guy's going to tank school. The other guy's going to get his ear blown off in submarine school. I don't know. And Peter Bonner's, you're going to Long Island City. The guy standing next to me, I said, what's there? And he said, it's, what's there? And he said, it's the movie place, you fuck.

Yeah, the Marx Brothers made animal crackers and coconuts there. Oh, yeah. Yeah, it's historic. King Kong stuff. Sure, absolutely.

Absolutely. And I directed some wonderful stuff there. I directed a show, I don't remember, but I directed some wonderful stuff there. I directed a show. I don't remember. But I went back as a director. Did you leave the Army and rejoin the premise? Or I'm trying to figure out how you got to the committee.

I left the Army, and this guy who was directing me at the premise had a friend named Alan Meyerson who was starting a theater company in San Francisco and I went and got plugged into that theater company called The Committee. Which is an historic improvisational... And the old bocce court. Exactly. Yeah. It was actually next to the old bocce.

Oh, it was next to the... Obviously it was long gone. And what do you remember? By the time I was of age. Hey, what's the deal with the sponsors on Gilbert Gottfried's Amazing Colossal Podcast? Yes! We'll see you next time. A nice tan? Sorry, nope. But a box fan? Happily, yes. A day of sunshine? No. A box of fine wines? Yes. Uber Eats can definitely get you that.

Get almost, almost anything delivered with Uber Eats. Order now. Alcohol in select markets. Product availability may vary by Regency app for details. The Scorebet app here with trusted stats and real-time sports news. Yeah, hey, who should I take in the Boston game? Well, statistically speaking... Nah, no more statistically speaking. I want hot takes.

I want knee-jerk reactions. That's not really what I do. Is that because you don't have any knees? Or... The Scorebet. Trusted sports content, seamless sports betting. Download today. 19 plus, Ontario only.

If you have questions or concerns about your gambling or the gambling of someone close to you, please go to connexOntario.ca. Hi, I'm Patton Oswalt, and something's gone horribly wrong because you're listening to Gilbert Gottfried's amazing Colossal Podcast. We now return. Why? Why do we have to return to Gilbert Gottfried's Amazing Colossal Podcast?

What do you remember about working with Woody Allen back then? Nothing. Nothing at all. Because I didn't work with him, I worked against him. That's how Woody went off, and I came on. I followed a really funny guy, a genius. Did he really have new material every time you saw him? I don't know.

Yeah. That's how it appeared to me. Okay, so who was in the committee? It was Howard Hesseman, who we love. Yeah, you know. You got it written down there. I know.

I can see your eyes. But we're going to go through it for our listeners. Roger Bowen, who we loved. Oh. Remember Roger Bowen? He was Henry Blake in the M.A.S.H. movie. Oh, Roger. Remember Roger Bowen? He was Henry Blake in the MASH movie.

Oh, okay. And Carl Gottlieb, who was here on the show. Great people. Yes. Was there any... Larry, Larry Hankin. Oh, Larry Hankin, who's still around. Funny guy.

Oh, yes. Yes, yes. Was there any written material, Peter, with the committee, or was it all improvised? Well, what is writing? Okay. You know, what we would do is we would do sketches that were developed from improvisational undertakings. So we would go out and ask an audience, give us an idea of a social occasion.

Someone would say, blind date. And then a man or woman would go on stage and they'd improvise a scene about a blind date. And if it worked that time, we would then take it into workshop. I see. And we'd work it up into a scene and look for an ending,

because the sad thing about improvising on the stage is unless you're brilliant, unless you're really Severin Darden or Mike Nichols or Elaine May, you don't come up with endings bang like that, usually. Sometimes you do, and you impress yourself. But usually you workshop these things. You cut them down.

That's what occasioned my initial work as a director is I would help to form these improvisational undertakings into scenes. So you could say that I was writing. Of a sort. Boy, what a given to see the committee in those days, to see all those people up there. And Mel Stewart, who we loved. Oh, yeah, Gary.

Gary Goodrow. Gary Goodrow. Oh, oh, oh. Was Rob Reiner in there at some point? Yeah, yeah, yeah yeah he was in the workshops and he would guest star he never was i don't think he was ever paid as a performer i see um but the thing to remember about the committee in those days this was the uh the 60s uh and early 70s so it was vietnam and the psychedelic revolution so So we had it all in San Francisco.

We could be impactful politically every night. We would go out and do agitprop theater. We were working really hard as artists to stop that foolish war. really hard as artists to stop that foolish war. We would go off in the afternoons to Berkeley and attend demonstrations and entertain the people on the steps of Sproul Hall. At night, Joan Baez and Bob Dylan would come in to see the show. How about that? Wow.

You know, we'd go and see the music and they'd in to see the show. How about that? Wow. You know, we'd go and see the music, and they'd come to see our show. San Francisco at that time was a swell place to be. That's sort of how you got discovered for legitimate television, for legitimate acting roles, right? They sent Fred Roos to see you and some casting people? But before that, a wonderful director named John Cordy had seen the show at the committee, and we went out to lunch, and he said,

I'm thinking maybe doing a film about a performer in improvisational theater. So we got together, and we concocted a film which turned out to be Funny Man. And we raised money. In those days, you could raise $250,000 in San Francisco and made the film and took it to New York Film Festival. And it did reasonably well.

And a William Morris agencies, chap saw the film and signed me up and that was good because William Morris in those days was one of the premier agencies. So that was important. And then my friend Sandy Barron got a job in a television show called Hey Landlord.

And he invited me down to see the show and I met Gary Marshall, I met some other people and Jerry Paris, and they had me down to do a guest star, and that sort of got me seen in Los Angeles. I see. And the rest is history. Getting back to that thing with endings, I think that's where monty python developed that giant boot that crushes all the animations would just stop or they would have they would have another actor walk in and just stop the sketch yeah this is silly yes yeah yeah yeah or just say now for

something completely sure to avoid writing it we We had the same thing at the committee, and Ted Flicker did, although it was harder for Ted because they only had four actors at some stage. Sometimes they were all on stage at the same time. It was hard to turn the lights off on stage. So one of the actors, Ted, usually would reach off when the scene just was going on and on. He'd wait for what could be described as laughter,

and he'd reach off to the side and pull the light switch. So the – Blackout. Exactly. We just turned the lights off. Whatever works. Gilbert, did you ever do improv? Did you ever, would you be good at something like that?

Fast on your feet? Yeah, I would do improv. But I, it was funny. You know, when you ask comics to do improv, comics go for the joke. Yeah. to do improv comics go for the joke yeah and it's like you know you don't want to play by like you know they go where they go oh there are certain rules well well yeah there there are rules and you just hit upon one of paul sill's rules don't do jokes because what a joke does is it stops the dramatic flow of a human interchange. Right?

Yes. You tell a joke here and it stops our conversation. Interesting. Because we laugh and then we say, oh, now what happens? Oh. And a dramatic scene or a comedic scene, something always has to happen next. Famously, Mike Nichols repeatedly told Doc Simon, don't go for the joke. Go for the human interaction.

That's what the audience is going to remember. They're not going to remember your jokes. interaction. That's what the audience is going to remember. They're not going to remember your jokes. They're going to remember Felix and what's his name? Oscar. Oscar. That's what they're going to remember. That relationship. Not your jokes. So the comic always goes for the jokes. So when we were casting a show on improvisational theater, we didn't look for comedians.

We looked for actors who were funny. There's a difference. Yeah, that's interesting. Peter Cook was one of the funniest actors I've ever worked with. And if you look at a Peter Cook monologue, it's not jokes. It's I could have been a judge if I only had the Latin mm-hmm that's not a joke yeah that describes an entire sad person thinking he could have been something yes if he had just spoken Latin since you brought up Peter Cook can I jump ahead to you

directing the two of us and and and working with one of your comedy heroes oh man he was i know you're a fan of beyond the fringe and uh no there have been certain jobs that i've had where i would go to work with such anticipation and come home younger and more awake than when i left wow and. And that was true with Peter Cook, and I must say it was true with Tim Allen. Mm-hmm. Working, I don't know how he is today, because I've watched Last Man Standing, and he's gotten sort of stricter.

He doesn't seem as free with himself. I don't know. That's because we probably differ politically. Maybe I'm reading that in. But going to work with Tim Allen or Peter Cook, it was such a joy on the set because they would constantly amuse themselves and everybody within earshot. Using everything they had. Props. The dialogue as written.

The dialogue as not written. The cameraman falling asleep. Whatever. It was a joy to work with. That's a nice thing to say about those people. Oh, my gosh. Could we ask you about some of these early TV roles? Because you brought up Gary Marshall and Jerry Belson's Hey, Land's hey landlord we love talking about sandy baron by the way any

excuse to talk about sandy baron you did sanford and son you did the adams family yeah you did a bunch of family the only reason i did did the adams family is uh i was living in new york and they wanted me to come out to do a uh a pilot no they didn't want me to do the and they wanted me to come out to do a pilot. No, they didn't want me to do the pilot. They wanted me to do a test for a pilot. It was sort of a ripoff of Get Smart. And so I went out and they flew me all the way out from New York City, put me up in a hotel. So this was expensive, cost maybe $1,000.

So to pay for it, they cast me in The Addams Family. I see. And that show, the only part available was, I don't know, a CPA or something. But I had to look older, so they actually grayed my hair.

So if you see me in that, it's a 28-year-old guy with shoe polish in his hair. You're a young actor. I heard you say John Astin was good to you. Oh, he was very nice. He stayed on after work and acted with me in my screen test. Well, he loves actors.

He's still teaching acting in Baltimore. Oh, really? Yeah. He's teaching in the drama school. He bears his name. Yeah. Any memories of Red Fox on Sanford and Son? Oh, I came to work with a gun.

That's a good one. I don't know why. Most people weren't caring. I assume you two guys are sitting there in New York and you're armed because these days everybody in the world is armed. But in those days, not everybody was armed. You know, the National Rifle Association wasn't bigger than the post office in those days. But he came to work one day, and at the reading, I don't know, he said, I'm here for the reading,

and then I'm going to the track, okay? And the writers looked at each other, and the producer looked at me. I was directing, and I was supposed to say, well, no, we're going to rehearse. And before anybody could say anything, he reached into his pocket and pulled out this enormous Smith & Wesson and went,

put this gun on the table. So there was no argument with Red in those days. But I'll tell you, that being said, he was funny. Oh, yeah. Boy, oh, boy, was he funny. And people who write for funny people do get it. Like you guys have researched a guy named Peter Bonners. I can tell by the questions you're asking and the knowledge you have of my life.

They sit down and they look at the material. They listen to the material. They think about it. They talk about it. So by the time they write for the star, the Gilbert Gottfried, they know that guy. They know the rhythm. The people who wrote for Newhart, boy, they had him down. Newhart would be astonished sometimes at how they got his voice and his voicings.

That's fascinating. And that was true of Red. And this wasn't a room full of older black fellows. No, it was Bernstein and Turtletaub. Exactly. What was that story? A Jew from Toronto. Was he Get Me My Jews? Oh, yeah.

That Red Fox story? Red Fox at one point got angry, and he was very militant at one point. And he said, no, I want just black people working for me. And they got old black people, and the shows weren't working out. The scripts, the material was terrible. The scripts weren't there on time. Everything was off. And then finally, Red Fox throws his hands up in the air and goes, get me my juice back.

Absolutely. Absolutely. That's hilarious. I'm going to. Go ahead, Gil. Oh, I heard a story and another name that pops up on the show a lot that Danny Thomas used to carry a gun. Oh, really? Interesting. Well, I never worked

with Danny Thomas, so I have no knowledge. Well, you know, Bill Persky, who you did work with, Billy, on That Girl, Bill directed Demond Wilson

in a show called Baby, I'm Back, and he told us that he carried a gun, too. So there's both sanford and son i don't know what it was i don't know either persky and uh den off and yeah persky and den off damon didn't get along oh no they didn't get along oh because i remember i said to persky that now i heard damon wilson's a preacher, and Persky said, there's no God.

Very good. I've got to read this real quick, Peter, because this is just fun for us. We alluded to it in the beginning of the show. This is a very short list of the people that have been here on this show that you've worked with in your career. And I do a lot of research. I don't think we've ever had anybody here who's

worked... This breaks the record. I'm going to go through it quick. We mentioned Jessica Walter, Chuck McCann, Mike McKean, Lee Merriweather, Hal Linden. We just mentioned Bill Persky, who you work with on That Girl. Ken Berry, Bernie Coppell, Paul Dooley, Stuart Margolin, Stephen Weber, Dee Wallace, Alan Thicke, Andrea Martin, Joyce Van Patten, John Amos,

Tony Roberts, the late great Jay Thomas, David Steinberg, and Norman Steinberg, Penn Jillette, Billy Persky again, Ed Asner, Bill Macy, Norman Lear, Carl Reiner, Carl Gottlieb, Buck Henry, Richard Benjamin, Richard Kind, Adam West, future guest Alan Alda, we'll throw in Dick Cavett, and you played Ed Weinberger,

who we had on this show. Yes. But you didn't mention Captain Kangaroo. Oh, he didn't have one. I tell you, he was a fabulous human being. Captain Kangaroo, you didn't mention Robert Kennedy, or rather John Kennedy Jr.? Oh, those are people who aren't here. These were all people we had on the show.

Oh, these were people we had on the show. These were all our guests. Amazing. Yeah. Amazing. Yeah, 28. You broke the record. You broke it. Well, that's true. These are all our guests. Amazing. You break the record. You broke it. Not counting Gilbert Gottfried. Most people don't.

Yeah, that's what's so amazing. I kept finding our guests and doing the research. We've never had him on the show, but I had to get to this. Did you once direct O.J. Simpson? Oh, not only direct him. I worked with him as he was one of the executive producers on a show. It was a rather low point in my career. I had wished to be a motion picture director, so I went out and directed a couple of pictures.

The mistake that I made was somebody came at me with a script, and they said, do you want to direct this picture? And what I heard was, do you want to direct this picture? The question I should have heard was, do you want to direct this picture. The question I should have heard was, do you want to direct this picture? Oh. Yeah, so I picked the wrong script or two. And they sent me to movie jail. I see.

When you go out and you're a newcomer film director and you fail in your first two films, the phone doesn't ring. It just sort of sits there, menacing. So I was really not desperate, but I was looking for work. And O.J. Simpson had this show called First in Ten. They were looking for a director. And it meant directing, I don't know, 20-some shows in 15 days

using football players and pads in the heat of summertime. So I did direct O.J. And he was a very incredibly charming fellow and incredibly powerful personality. You used the word earlier, sociopath. I did. That would describe O.J. Yeah, clearly. But I do remember his relationship to the Los Angeles Police Department.

We'd be on location a lot, and every day we'd have lunch outdoors at big picnic tables, and hundreds of police would show up for autographs. And they'd bring footballs, they'd bring helmets, they'd bring jerseys. And he loved the police, and they loved him. the police and they loved him so when this thing happened with his wife uh i i wasn't at all surprised at the uh care they they treated him with because he was one of their own they they really liked oj and i i think they took a while before they made the obvious decision to, well, wait a second. When a wife is killed like that violently, who's the first person you suspect? Always. It's the husband.

Always. In OJ, it took them like 10 days to even say, well, wait a minute. Who's she married to again? And it's funny. They were very slow. Interesting. How they played up like the racist police department. But meanwhile, they were his fans and his friends.

Oh, they were. But Johnny Cochran was a fabulous lawyer. And the people who – I think the guy who uncovered – what was the police detective's name? Furman. Mark Furman. Mark Furman. The people who uncovered that – the person who uncovered that name was Jeff Toobin of the New York Times. Oh, yes.

He's the guy who did the research that uncovered that name, and then that name got to Johnny Cochran and his lawyers. History is very strange. It is. You want to talk about show business. Show business. I hope you never said to OJ he's giving a bad performance or anything. Act better. No, the fact is he didn't give bad performances, but he didn't give good performances either.

He just behaved like OJ, like the sports guy that he was. He knew enough to behave like himself. He had the right smile. Oh, well, he was a sports announcer. He was a color guy. He was, by the time he did the show, he had done any number of television commercials. He was the Avis guy.

Sure. I hope he's in the Towering Inferno by that point, too. He did some movies. He had a whole career. The one job that you failed to mention, By that point, too. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's the movies. No, he had a whole career. Yeah, yeah, yeah. The one job that you failed to mention. Yes. Ha, ha. Which was one of my last jobs was directing a circus show.

Okay. Up in Seattle and, again, in San Francisco called Teatro Zanzani. And it's an in-the-round variety circus show. So I got to work with all these international circus stars. That's fun. Jugglers and unicyclists and magicians and stuff. Oh, that was great. And it reminded me it's all show business.

It all is. Whether it's a multi-hundred-dollar, hundred-million-dollar movie or a little comedy club at an airport. It's all show business. You love show business. I saw that in the interview. Well, it's the thing that I like. Whether it was a circus or a big movie or a little television show, I really do like show business because you're giving people something back. Oh, yeah. You're taking their lives and saying, well, this is what's funny about your life.

This is what's good about your life. This is how you can act better. It comes back to that, Gilbert. that gilbert yeah and now after all in the family ended there was a a strange show yeah i that i always found it very awkward to watch called archie bunker's place that you directed right now what was wrong with that show i love the way you ask questions yeah it wasn't peter's fault no no there wasn't anything right about it except for carol carol o'connor and uh marty balsam martin balsam yeah yeah uh and and they had some really good writers, but it wasn't about anything. It was about him sitting at a bar and just being Archie Bunker.

That wasn't what All in the Family was. All in the Family was Meathead and his black neighbor and his wife and Maude. It was about America at that time. Archie Bunker's Place was about a bar at the corner. It wasn't even as good as, well, I don't want to go there, but it just wasn't about anything. It was about, let's try to keep this franchise alive for another 15 minutes. Did you enjoy working with Carol O'Connor? Sure. Yeah.

Well, that goes back to our previous discussion. I enjoyed it because it was show business. Uh-huh. Because I remember you. Huh? No, I remember the show every episode of it just kind of sat there. Well, he sat there. Yeah.

In Archie Bunker's place, he sat there too. But they all ran around him. Right. She was running around him. She was making chicken casserole. Meathead was coming in. The neighbor was coming in.

They gave him the little girl on on archie bucker's place that they tried to make the uh what was her name danielle brebois they tried to make her the conflict exactly exactly well you try to add these these things it's like you make a i know you make some soup at home and you should just let it go if it's not working don't keep adding and we talked to norman about. He doesn't have anything nice to say about it either. And what was Martin Balsam like? He was – well, by the time I met him on Catch-22, where I actually did meet him, and then again on Archie Bunker's place, he was a grand old man, and he had wonderful stories about theater, about working with Sidney Lumet in 1212.

Sure. Angry man. Sure. And, you know, it wasn't so much working with him. It was being with him. That's great. Because he was a grand veteran of the show business. Of the show business.

Yeah. I love that. Joyce Van Patten's ex-husband, by the way, Martin Balsam. Oh. Yes. Father and mother of Talia Balsam. This just in. Yes.

Who was married to George Clooney. Since we're bringing up Norman Lear 2. George Clooney, George Clooney, I directed in a show called ER. Oh, the first ER. Not the one-hour version, but the wonderful Norman Lear half-hour show. Oh, was that good.

Yeah, the one with Elliot Gould. Elliot Gould, yeah. Oh, that was a fabulous show. I was going to say, speaking of Norman Lear, Apple Pie was a show that I liked with Rue McClanahan and Jack Guilford. You directed that, too. I did. I directed the pilot. Yeah.

And that, like the ER show, was from a play in Chicago. You know, what Norman did in those days is he would get ideas from elsewhere. You know, All in the Family was a London show. ER was a Chicago play. The show Apple Pie was from, I think, an off-Broadway play about the Depression. It was really a terrific show. Got a great cast. And a great, great cast, wonderful scripts.

Charlie Houck, who is a magnificent writer, really wrote sensational stuff. We had Richard Libertini on the show. Oh, I love him. We had great actors on the show. the show we had great actors on on the show um the but it was a period piece half hour comedy and i think that kept it from working as well as it should have worked with the american public there was nothing wrong with the show the show was great but i don't think it was ever accepted i don't think people want to sit home and look at period pieces now now that being being said they they did like that 50s show in chicago with um um what was the name of that show set in mill oh happy days happy days yeah yeah that was

a period piece but it was it wasn't the depression period right yeah well gary david goldberg did also had trouble with uh finding an audience for that brooklyn bridge another period show good period show i don't even remember that marion ross what was the show that uh rob reiner rob was that the show that gelbart uh i think he was he played an immigrant yes uh it was short-lived well you see bud york and norman lear might have been behind that show yeah i'll think of the name of it in a minute i think many have tried but few have succeeded yeah to do period period half hours i think the audience for a half hour, I speak like I know something. But I've directed a lot of them and acted a fair share.

I think audiences really want to see themselves up there with a laugh track. Yeah, that's interesting. And I'm not kidding about the laugh track. I just saw again the other day a piece about two people putting together a situation comedy, and the argument was about the laugh track. And I've always made the argument for the laugh track that you're sitting at home watching television, and something funny happens or something funny is said. And if you've got that laugh track, you become a member of a larger audience. You're not just sitting there alone in your home or with your small family. You're given permission to laugh at it.

That's interesting. Because you're in an audience. That's what makes live theater so wonderful. I remember they did an episode of The Odd Couple without a laugh track. First season. Yeah. And it was kind of awkward to watch. Yeah.

Yeah. No, we've all tried it. For a whole season of Murphy Brown, for example, while Candice's husband, Louis, was terminal, she could only work two, three days a week. And we didn't have time to really get the show mounted correctly for an audience. And that was a big show anyway. So we do it without an audience. So anyway, so we do it without an audience. But what we did is we hired actors to be in the audience.

And they were advised, don't laugh just because you think it's supposed to be funny. Only laugh if you want to laugh. And they were a very good audience. That's interesting. Yeah. How many people would you put out there? Let's see. Probably about 50.

Interesting. And then you'd multiply the laughs. That's different. The problem is I saw with later sitcoms, as I did the last sitcom I directed was three, four years ago. The audiences come in so hot. They've been warmed up to such a degree that they over-laugh the shows. They literally laugh at anything. A kid walks on with suspenders. You know, they're just, they want to perform as an audience.

That's why they're there. That's why they get free pizzas or a t-shirt. Laugh tracks almost seem quaint now, like it's really becoming a thing of the past, if you look at comedy on television. Well, I don't. Yeah. I don't look at television comedy. I watch't. Yeah. I don't look at television comedy. I watch television.

You know, I watch Better Call Saul. I watch The Deuce. I watch shows that I really like. I think The Wire is still the best television ever made. And I'll watch some shows that have humor in them but but i i don't know the last half hour comedy that i watched maybe it's a function of my getting old i don't know but i do what i want to do now i don't do i don't look at stuff just because like it's your job to look at stuff because you have a show on the air which necessitates your being up to date.

I don't have to be up to date with anything. I can read two newspapers a day or not. It's a nice luxury. Well, it is, but I'm a very lucky guy. We will return to Gilbert Gottfried's Amazing Colossal Podcast after this. wins, the show starring Jeremy Alan White, Io Debrey, and Maddie Matheson is ready to heat up screens once again. All new episodes of FX's The Bear

are streaming June 27, only on Disney+. Let's talk about a show that didn't have to rely on a laugh track. That's the great Bob Newhart show. And we want to ask you about this. The timing of this is unfortunate, but your friend

Bill Daley just passed away and we thought we'd ask you a memory or two Gilbert and I are such admirers he was as Bob said he was the bullpen guy when a scene was flagging if they, they'd figure out a way to bring Bill's character on. It's like a bullpen pitcher.

You just go to his character, and you can get a laugh. And you don't have to strain for it. You know, he's late. He forgot to wind his watch. He could just make stuff work quickly. And Bob trusted him. They were old Chicago friends. And, you know, he wasn't the most reliable fellow.

He could get nervous. He could forget his lines and stuff. He could forget his lines and stuff. And other people could get frustrated with takes one, two, three, four, five, because he would forget a line or a name or something. Bob never did. How nice. Never got frustrated with him.

There was a great love there. And he was one of those guys that I wouldn't say act better because he was always as good as he was going to be. I see. No, he really came as prepared as he could. And if he gave him too much direction or tried something too much, it would unnerve him a little bit. He was a natural funny guy and a very charming guy and a real ladies' man. Oh. He could charm the pants off anybody.

And as his sons said repeatedly in the obits, he – oh, that's my telephone. That's okay. It's usually Gilbert's going off here. I'll just shut it off here. His son said he was the happiest guy he knew. I saw that. It was sweet. Yeah.

And he looked for ways to be happy. That's what he said. He looked for ways to be happy. That's what he said. He looked for ways to be happy every day. And when something unhappy presented itself, he'd just sort of turn aside. That's a nice quality. It's a remarkable quality, really, yeah. And I heard Bob Newhart used to write his dialogue around the set. He'd have it on, like, furniture.

Very rarely. No, it is a funny thing. That's a brand new move. No, it's a visual thing that he tells of himself. But every once in a while, they would write these long phone calls because Bob was known as a monologist who talked on the phone. And they were sometimes three pages long. And he would often, if he was home, write them. In his office, it was easy because he would have a desk and some yellow pads there.

But at home, he just had the couch. So we'd put him on cards and pasted them to the back of the couch so he could be on the phone standing on set facing this big, long wall of text. And he was very good. I mean, actors get good at reading cue cards. They had taped up this stuff with masking tape or something. And in the middle of this conversation, the tape started to unpeel from a corner.

So if you can visualize this, the corner came down and slowly started to disappear from his view. He started to bend over to read it. And I'm watching him say, what the hell is he doing? And finally just gave up and laughed. And he said, cut, cut, cut. And then he ripped the cue cards off and showed the audience. And he said, cut, cut, cut. And then he ripped the cue cards off and showed the audience. And he said, this is what happened. You guys met on the set of Catch-22 for the first time?

Catch-22, yeah. And I threw myself at his feet because as a kid in Milwaukee, I probably did some of his material in the nightclubs in Milwaukee when I was a drummer. And I remember I was selling records at a record store in Milwaukee when his record hit. It was so popular that we just didn't get the box of records in on Monday and put it on the shelf. We just took the box of records and put it on the counter. And people would come in and buy copies. The button-down mind. Yeah, that's how popular that record was.

Oh, yeah. For spoken word records in those days, it was phenomenal. Later on, Shelley sold a lot of records, and Lenny Bruce sold a lot of records, and Elaine May and Mike Eccles, but Bob was really there with the button down mind first. I found it interesting too, doing the research. I never knew this and I know the show so well, that it changed.

You were not originally a dentist. Right. I was a psychiatrist. You were both shrinks. And what was the premise that Lorenzo Music and Dave Davis came up with? He was a Freudian and you were going to be a Jungian? Exactly so. Yeah.

Yeah. He was an established guy and I was sort of an off-the-wall, let's try anything. I see. It turns out that that's probably the better way to be a psychiatrist these days because the Freudians that I know have sort of given up on that, and they become behaviorals and cognitive folks now. The reason in those days was it tested badly. Oh, did it? Yeah. They accepted Bob because he was Bob Doerr.

Yeah. And they had a little trouble with the behavioralist, me. They liked me. Bob liked me, so they tried to figure out a way to keep me on the show. But Shane changed the character. So between the pilot and the show, a couple things changed. I think in the original show, Suzanne was going to have a baby. Yes, I'd read that.

And Bob – that didn't test – or maybe it was Bob. You know, babies and sitcoms aren't necessarily a good idea either. It's throwing that thing into the pot. Murphy Brown's a good example. You have a phenomenally successful Murphy Brown who is a cervic and really a ball buster and very negative all the time. And then you give her a baby. So now she has to be maternal. Now – Change the character.

I can't say it didn't work because it did work, especially the pregnancy episodes. But the more she had to care for that child, the less seconds she would have to be a ball buster. Anyway, Bob didn't want the baby. And I think that turned out beautifully for the show because he and Emily could continue to be the Bickersons. I think babies on shows is usually a sign of desperation. Well put. That's interesting. Now tell us about Suzanne Plachette. Loved her.

Trained actress. Talk about show business. Her father was the, I think he was the manager, the production chief of the Paramount Theater in New York. They lived on Park Avenue. They had some money. Her mother didn't cook. They ate in restaurants every night. She was a show business baby.

Her father would take her to the theater. Oh, this is Benny Goodman. Oh, Frank Sinatra. She met Frank Sinatra when she was probably nine. So she grew up in show business royalty. She went to Syracuse. She was phenomenally pretty. She went to Syracuse University and then came to New York and studied acting.

So she was all set. And then she acted and acted and acted, and then she became a movie star. She was really smart, really talented. She could write. She could write poetry. She was a very smart businesswoman. She was married to Tommy Gallagher, who took care of her. If you're show business royalty, if you're a big star like Suzanne Plachette, it's good to have a man who understands it. And he took care of her.

He would shield her from those untoward things that happen to females in show business. He took care of her business affairs. He was a smooth operator. Smoked English oval cigarettes and lit them with one of those Dunhill lighters that Leslie Howard uses in the movies. You know, he was really a smooth guy.

They were so well-matched, really. I mean, whoever thought to put her with Bob Newhart. I think it was – I don't know who it was. Everybody claims credit for it. But I would think it might have been Mary's husband. What was his name? The head of MGM Studios. Grant. I think it was Grant. Or maybe Bob's manager. Somebody saw her on The Tonight Show. Interesting. She was just a talking head guest and said, boy, oh, boy, she's a young, beautiful, tart-tongued Jewess with laconic Midwest Bob Newhart. Whoa, wow. Yeah, they were perfect. Yeah, wow. They were perfect.

Yeah, yeah. They were, as you say, perfect. Why are you so interested? I thought you didn't believe in IQ tests. Well, Emily, if I can give up three hours of my life to take an IQ test, you can give up three seconds of your life to answer it for me. What was the score? I don't think people should know their IQs.

Well, you know your IQ. Well, that's different. I have to know mine. Well, I have to know mine. What was it? 129. 129. That's good, isn't it? Oh, that's very good, Bob. That's almost gifted. Almost gifted. What's, uh uh What's yours?

Oh, it's not important Oh, I know it's not important But what is it? Oh I'm embarrassed Well, honey, don't be embarrassed I had four more years of college Than you had on your feet

Bob, it's 151 Don't be embarrassed. I had four more years of college than you had on your period. Bob, it's 151. It's good, too. And Gilbert worked with Jack Riley a couple of times, didn't you, on The Tonight Show? Oh, I never actually worked with him directly. Oh, you didn't? I remember he used to... I thought you interacted with him. I ran into him there.

He looked like the guy in the Hale-Bopp comic cult. The Heaven's Gate cult. It was so weird. He looked like that guy, exactly like him. So he had a resurgence in his career oh oh he was he was always there yeah no jack jack raleigh was one of those guys who was always bubbling up you know when they when he died uh i i wasn't able to be there so i wrote a little testimonial and was really just a sort of semiotic list of all the roles he played. And it was read by someone, and they said he got really good laughs, good sentimental laughs,

just recalling the roles like Angry Man and Sport Coat. All kinds of those roles. Do you still get mail, Peter, do I have this right, from the fans of the Newhart Show? Well, you don't know if they're fans, really. Oh, I see. Obsessives. They're people living in towns you've never heard of i see and i i think i don't know what what my autograph gets these days but i when i was a minor celebrity there for a while i would play

in these golf tournaments and i was in a a golf cart one day with a caddy, and he asked for my autograph. I said, what's your name? He said, Phil. I said, Phil, why is a 13-year-old kid like you asking me? You don't even know who I am. Why are you asking me for my autograph? And he said, $29. Oh, geez.

That's what he could get for my autograph in 1970 or whatever. I love that. So, yes, I get mail. But sometimes I think it's just for the $29 that they're going to sell it for. Put it on eBay. I don't know. I would guess that I'm down to $13.50 at this point. There's so much stuff we could ask you about.

Thank you. Yes. Well, you can have me back. I'd love to ask you about directing Walter Cronkite. I will be entirely different next time. Will you interview better next time? Yes. I will come with the accent.

How is that? I will come as Federico Fellini, and you can ask me all about La Strada. What about, let's see, do you want to talk about hanging out with Orson Welles on the set of Catch-22? You don't hang out with Orson Welles. But we heard Richard Benjamin's version of the events.

Oh, yes? And Buck Henry. Everybody, yeah. And I think Bogdanovich was there at certain points. Yeah, we were all there. All the important people. Yeah. Do you want to tell us about directing Walter Cronkite?

Was that a bizarre experience? No, no. Oh, what was his name? Bob Kendrick, Bob, Bob Kelson. Oh, he didn't come dressed as Captain Kangaroo. Oh, Bob Keeshan. He was the nicest man. Bob what?

Bob Keeshan. Bob Keeshan came. Right. He was the nicest man. Bob what? Bob Keishon. Bob Keishon came. Right. I'll tell you this. Of all the stars we've had on the show that I directed, his appearance on that rehearsal day got more applause than anybody else. Captain Kangaroo. Bob Keishon.

I love that. That's great. Well, because people had grown up with this wonderful chap. God knows what the people would have done if we had had Mr. Rogers on. They would have lauded him. He was a giant. I also directed Walter Cronkite. Yeah, I have that on my cards.

And at a certain point, I wanted Walter Cronkite to look at the camera, and he turned to me and said, you know, I've done this before. Perfect. There's so many things we could ask you about, Peter. Well, don't. We barely got into it. Well, next time we sit with you, we'll talk about medium cool. Well, the next time, you can ask me about other things or other people besides myself. Yeah. I'll just make a lot of the shit up anyway, as I've been doing all day today.

I'll ask you quickly. You work with one of Gilbertbert's favorites and that's jack gilford yes oh oh my goodness yes jack gilford was uh you know he would have possibly been as big as zero mustel but he's he's he's one of those people whose career was absolutely subtended by the blacklist absolutely he was a known communist sympathizer and he had a big career going and he couldn't get a job great talent first yeah yeah and i worked worked with him he was he was one of those guys uh who uh delivered you know you'd come come to work and and by the time I worked with him, he was playing the geezer, and he could play it better than anybody. There are sad things in show business, and the blacklist is another one of those sad things. Darrell Bock Absolutely.

Darrell Bock That we do to ourselves. It's like guns. The country has a way of doing itself in every once in a while. We're living through it. Absolutely. Unfortunately. I got one more for you. Yeah. Go ahead. Peter Ustinov.

What time is it? Peter. Any memories of working with him? Well, he was a very good artist, and he drew on the back of a napkin, he drew a picture of Brezhnev when the Cold War was bubbling up and and uh he he drew this caricature of brezhnev and on the bottom there was a quote saying uh where we won't invade poland or something he was a real wit wasn't he yes yes he was and uh again by the by the time we worked together, I was an actor on the show. I played his nephew or grandson.

Written by Rod Serling. Yes. Yeah. Here, I'll tell you a Rod Serling story rather than a Peter Ustinov story. Okay. It was the table reading, and we all came into this CBS studio, and we all had green leather binders with our names in gold on them. So it was a very special

event. We all sat down and opened our green leather binders to page one, and we read and we read and we read. Peter didn't open his, or I mean Rod, didn't open his binder. And we got to the middle of the thing and uh peter missed um replaced a word and rod sterling said i believe that's uh and and corrected him Without ever opening the book. Without ever opening the book. That's great. That's a writer's story. It was really scary. That is great. So.

Well, we'll probably wrap, Peter. Okay, good. We could go on for hours. It's ten after five, and this is when the little cuckoo clock in my living room goes cuckoo five times, and my hand automatically reaches for the bottle of Johnny Walker. It's like those sketches. We have no ending.

Turn the lights off. Goodbye Frank. Goodbye Gilbert. We thank you for doing this. We'll do a quick sign off. Hang on. Okay. Okay this has been Thank you for doing this. We're going to do a quick sign off. Hang on. Okay. Okay. This has been Gilbert Gottfried's Amazing Call.

Yes. You forgot the name of the show. Peter, he forgot the name of the show. Act better. Could you direct him through the clothes? Put your glasses on. Read the words written in front of you. With the great Peter Bonner. Peter, this was fun for us.

Okay. Good trip down memory lane. Good. Well, it was fun for me, too. Good trip down memory lane. Good. Well, it was fun for me, too. It reminds me what a good time I've had in show business. Oh, great. And this is just for shits and giggles, but I want to direct people to find a clip online

of you helping a woman win $10,000 on the $20,000 pyramid. Oh, yeah. And I must say, you're probably the best clue giver I've seen on that show. She got the last answer with one second to go. Ah, that too is show business. I'm going to go. Web and social media is handled by Mike McPadden, Greg Pair, and John Bradley Seals. Special audio contributions by John Beach. Special thanks to John Murray, John Fodiatis, and Paul Rayburn. Bye.