The Extras - The Italian Job (1969) with Matthew Field

Episode Date: January 30, 2023

Matthew Field, the world's leading authority on the cult classic 1969 film THE ITALIAN JOB, joins the podcast for a behind-the-scenes look into the making of the film.  We start with a review of the cult status the film has achieved as one of the most popular films in the UK.  Matthew then takes us into the development of the film with writer Troy Kennedy Martin, producer Michael Deeley, and Paramount Studios head Robert Evans.  The production of the film has fascinating stories at every turn, and we delve into them all including the filming of the traffic jam in Turin, the classic mini cars, the stunts, the music, and the cliffhanger finale.Purchase:The Italian Job 4KThe Self Preservation Society bookBlade Runners, Deer Hunters, and Blowing the Bloody Doors Off bookThe Sitcom StudyWelcome to the Sitcom Study, where we contemplate the TV shows we grew up with and...Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify Warner Archive Store on Amazon Support the podcast by shopping with our Amazon Affiliate linkDisclaimer: This post contains affiliate links. If you make a purchase, I may receive a commission at no extra cost to you.The Extras Facebook pageThe Extras Twitter Warner Archive & Warner Bros Catalog GroupOtaku Media produces podcasts, behind-the-scenes extras, and media that connect creatives with their fans and businesses with their consumers. Contact us today to see how we can work together to achieve your goals. www.otakumedia.tv

Hi, I'm film historian and author John Fricke. I've written books about Judy Garland and the Wizard of Oz movie, and you're listening to The Extras. Hello and welcome to The Extras, where we take you behind the scenes of your favorite TV shows, movies, and animation, and their release on digital, DVD, Blu-ray, and 4K, or your favorite streaming site. I'm Tim Millard, your host. Today on the podcast, we have the world's leading authority on the 1969 film, The Italian Job,

which is being released on 4K on the 31st of January by Kino Lorber. Matthew Field is the author of several books on the film, including The Making of the Italian Job in 2003, and the more recent, The Self-Preservation Society, 50 Years of The Italian Job in 2003, and the more recent The Self-Preservation Society, 50 Years of the Italian Job, which came out in 2019. He's also the author of Michael Caine, You're a Big Man, and co-author on Some Kind of Hero, The Remarkable Story of the James Bond Films. And more importantly, for our podcast, he is also the producer of the extras for The Italian Job that were included with the previous DVD and Blu-ray release from Paramount. And those are now available on the new 4K release from Kino. Matthew Field, welcome to

The Extras. Well, Tim, thanks very much for having me on. It's a pleasure. Well, this year marks 54 years since the 1969 film, The Italian Job was released. And you don't obviously look old enough to have seen it when it first came out. So how did a guy like you get to be such a huge fan of this film? It was actually the first film I ever saw. My dad showed it to me when I was five years old in the mid 1980s. And I immediately just fell in love with it. I think it was the cars, the Mini Coopers. Both my grandmothers had Minis. So yeah, I immediately just fell in love with the movie. I just watched it over and over again. online when you're talking about different things, just talking about how big of a movie this is in the UK. And of course, I'm based here in Los Angeles and the American audience maybe isn't, it's not quite as rabid for this movie, but how big is this film in the UK? Oh, it's absolutely huge. I mean, it constantly features in top 10 polls all the time. I mean,

you know, Michael Caine is obviously one of the biggest movie stars out of the UK ever. The Mini was voted, you know, car of the century. It's got a Quincy Jones score, which people don't know about. So it's a massive, massive movie. And quite often when I'm in Los Angeles, talking about my work, I might mention The Italian Job. And people are quite quickly turn around and say, Oh, that's a great film with Mark Wahlberg. We absolutely love it. And I have to say, no, no, no, it was actually an original movie here in the UK that my nation absolutely loves. And the American remake was something completely different. Well, you wrote a book on Michael Caine as well as on the film itself. Talk a little bit more about him. How did he get involved in this? And he was pretty young in his career, wasn't he,

when he was cast for this role? Yeah, he was in his late 30s when he did this film. And I think it's one of the films which people will always associate with his career, the others being like Zulu, The Ipcris File, Alfie, Get Carter. The Italian Job sits in that set very nicely. And the film was actually written with him in mind. The screenwriter, Troy Kennedy Martin, actually wrote the script with him and then pitched it to Robert Evans at Paramount. Paramount wanted Robert Redford, but Troy said, no, no, it's got to be Michael Caine.

And he took it to Michael Caine and he loved it. Since he was, let's see, Troy wrote it with him in mind. Was he kind of the first one brought on or was Michael Daly the producer? Who kind of got this whole ball rolling for this? Well, it really all started with Robert Evans at Paramount, who, as I'm sure you know, turned that studio around in the late 60s with a whole bunch of iconic movies, then moving through with The Godfather in the early 70s. But Robert Evans really got the package together. And he believed in Michael Caine once, Troy Kennedy Martin had said it. But Robert Evans needed a producer in the UK to put the whole thing together. So he came to Michael Dealey, who at that point was very early on in his career.

But he went on to produce The Deer Hunter, which he won an Oscar for. And of course, Blade Runner with Ridley Scott. So they come together, they've got the script, and they get Michael on. Then this cast, I mean, this is like a huge cast. It's one of those like 60s ensemble casts that are just great, right? Great fun. How did that all kind of come together with the director, Peter Collison, and the rest of that cast? Well, I think Michael Daly realized he needed someone else above the title. He didn't want to make Alfie too. So he felt that's what it might be if it was just Michael Caine. And you had this other role of this old geezer in prison.

And so they offered it to Noel Coward because the director, Peter Collison, he was put in the actor's orphanage when he was a very young boy. And the patron of the orphanage was Noel Coward. And he'd always been very kind to him and got him his first job in show business. And so Peter Collinson said, I'd like to repay him by putting him in the Italian job. There's a lot of subsequent cast in it, supporting cast, people like Benny Hill, Irene Handel, Fred Emney, who were very popular on British television, that they just sprinkled in there to give it that comedic feel. Yeah. And going back to that whole thing with Neil Coward and Peter Collison, I mean, that was really unique. I mean, Nolan was basically retired by this time. He had to kind of, he wasn't really too active, right? So it was a pretty big deal to get him to come on board. Yeah, they had to lure him out of retirement. But I think he was quite amused by this idea of this little kid in the orphanage now directing a Paramount movie. And he sort of came out and

did it and was just a few days he had to do in Ireland over in Dublin. So I think he did it out of his love and respect for Peter. Well, the audio commentary I listened to just recently that you did with producer Michael Dealy. I mean, I encourage everyone who picks this up to listen to that. How did that come together? And when did you record that one? when I was about 19. And it was a bit of a crazy idea. I thought, you know, I loved making of books. Ever since I was a small kid, I remember getting the making of License to Kill, which was the 16th Bond film. And I remember seeing documentaries about the making of films later that Gold and I, I saw the making of that on TV. You know, back in the days when you used to get these one hour making ofs that really did a deep dive on the making of the movie. Someday, I want to be a part of that. I want to do something like that. And when I left school, I thought, I'm going to write a book.

And this, as I said to you at the beginning of the interview, this was my favorite film. The first film I think I told you I'd ever seen. And so I thought, I'm going to put together a book on this. And there'd been a very small documentary on over the Christmas of 1998. And I wrote to the production company of this documentary and said, can you forward some letters to the people that you've interviewed, which was Michael Dealy, the producer, Troy Kennedy Martin, the screenwriter. And then they were quite amused by this idea of this kid trying to get a book off the ground,

but they did it. And Michael Dealy wrote back to me, called me and said, look, I'm going to be in London. Let's go for lunch. And I think when he met me and he saw I was 18, I think he was quite amused by that as well. And he said, no, I'll help you out. And then, you know, we became great friends. I was so interested in his career as a filmmaker, like Blade Runner.

I mean, you know, what a man. Yeah, yeah. And he was the guy that really packaged that film and put it together. So, you know, we were talking, and he said to me, well, you know, have you spoken to Michael Caine yet? And I said, well, you know, I sent so many letters to his agent. I'm not getting a response. He says, don't worry, I'll deal with it. And I was a kid doing my student job working in the supermarket.

And my dad came in, just happened to be shopping. And he came up to me, he said, oh, he said, one of your friends called up this morning pretending to be Michael Caine. And I said, sorry? He said, yeah. They were doing the accent and everything. I said, what did you say? He said, well, I just played along with it. And he said, you know, he wants you to give him a call at the Ritz in Paris. Well, sure enough, it was Michael Caine. And that night I called Michael Caine at the Ritz in Paris. And he did a great interview with me. And then that book came out.

And that was 2000, 2001, when the book was finally published. And if you remember, Tim, that was the time when DVD extras and these special editions, the studios were putting these back catalog titles out with a really great package of extras. And The Italian Job was obviously a title that Paramount were going to have to do for the UK because it was going to do phenomenally well. But nobody knew where any of these people were. And I'd spent the previous three years locating everybody, interviewing them, gathering behind the scenes photographs from private collections. So I had amassed all this for the book. And I knew this was an avenue I was going to go into. So they called me and said, can you advise us on where these people are? And I said, well, I can,

but I want to co-direct and produce the documentary. And I thought they were going to laugh me out of the room. But they said, yeah, sure, fine. And they put me in touch with the production company in London who made a lot of extras at that time for Paramount. And together with a guy called Lancelot and Orion, we co-directed and produced that first package. And then of course, I did the commentary on that first disc with the producer, Michael. And then fast forward another few years, we were approaching the 40th anniversary. And by that point, we were entering into the world of Blu-ray and Paramount were like, well, we want to redo it. And by that point, we were entering into the world of Blu-ray and Paramount were like, well, we want to redo it. Can we do a new package? Can we add to what you did in 2002? And this time, I was able to get Michael Caine involved, Quincy Jones, Robert Evans, formerly of Paramount, a wonderful guy, sadly died just before the pandemic. And Peter Bart, formerly of Variety, who was also at the studio with Bob. And people like Remy Julien, who did all the car stunts, who wasn't available the first time around. So with a much bigger budget, we were able to flesh out the documentary, make it into a 90

minute documentary. We then did a whole stunts featurette where we put the original drivers from the cars back into minis 40 years later. So it's kind of been something which has stayed with me for 20 years. And then just before the pandemic in 2019, we hit the 50th anniversary where I did what I think is the definitive book now on the making of the film. So it's been a film that when I first saw at five years old has kind of been with me for the last 20 years in my professional career too. saw at five years old has kind of been with me for the last 20 years in my professional career too. Well, I watched the earlier version of those extras. And obviously when I get the 4k here, I'm going to dive into some of the full extras that are involved there. But I just said, you know, now that I, I didn't realize you were such a young guy when you did that, did a tremendous job. Even if you're a mature man talking to somebody like Michael Daly,

I mean, that's a bit of a, you know, you're going to feel a little bit intimidated maybe. But when you're 19, 20, that must have been a little bit intimidating to talk to somebody of his prowess, especially in the UK, where he's just done some of the probably the most popular films ever there. I think sometimes when you're younger, you may, maybe it's when you get older that you become more intimidated. I think I just went into this and, you know, it was youth. It was, it was maybe that youthful arrogance. I don't know. But the one thing about Michael is that Michael's taught me more about the movie business, I think, than, than anyone else.

And when the first Italian job book came out, he agreed to come over from Hollywood to help with the PR. And as I said, because this film is so popular over here, every TV station, radio station, national newspaper wanted to run a feature because this was the first book to delve behind the scenes of the nation's favorite movie. And Michael did all of that with us. And we spent so much time sitting around in green rooms, waiting to go on to radio and TV shows. And he would tell me these wonderful stories about his film career, working with Michael Cimino on The Deer Hunter, the night John Wayne gave him the Oscar for that film. And then all the problems they had on those dark days of making Blade Runner,

working with David Bowie on The Man Who Fell to Earth, which is another cult movie that he did with Nicholas Roeg. And over that time, we just became really good friends. And I said to him, Michael, you need to write an autobiography. All these incredible stories, you need to get down on paper. But I just don't think he was really that interested. And then one day he said, well, okay, kid. He said, if you're really interested, he says, why don't you do it? And by that point, I was in university and I would fly out to wherever he happened to be in the holidays. I would go to Cape Cod where he was living. He might be in London or he'd be in Los Angeles. And I go out there and we'd work on his autobiography together. And I have to say that was another really happy project because that came out

in 2008, Blade Runners, Deer Hunters, and Blowing the Bloody Doors Off. And even to this day, I still get some lovely emails and messages on social media from people that discover that book and discover his career. And as you said, an absolute fantastic filmography. And I think also one that's very varied. fantastic filmography. And I think also one that's very varied. I mean, quite often you'll look at people's filmography and you'll see that, not stereotyped, but they're almost branded in the style and the genre of films that they make. But I think you just look at those three films in Michael Daly's title of his autobiography, you've got a classic British comedy caper in the Italian job. You've got a Vietnam war picture with Deer Hunter. And then you've got one of the most

important science fiction films ever made with Blade Runner. I mean, you could, those three films, it's, they're so bizarre when you mention them all in the same sentence, but they were all kind of encouraged and developed and made by the same man. Yeah. Those three films alone. I mean, just top notch, A-list, everything. And then all the other films, it's, it's amazing. And it's a great story you just told about how sometimes you, it's a little bit of the timing in life, right?

The fact that nobody had done a book is kind of shocking on the Italian job. But then you brought a passion to it. And he obviously tapped into that. And you guys had the ability to meet on some level and really talk about that film. So, but in listening to that commentary and then also some of the other pieces, my sense is that he and Troy Martin had some differences of opinion on the script and where to go. And especially when it came to the ending, which, you know, he won as the producer. Talk a little bit about their relationship.

Okay, well, Troy Kennedy Martin, a wonderful writer, very serious in tone. I think if you look at his other projects, when Troy was still alive, if you talk to him about the Italian job, even though that's the project he will be most remembered for, I think he was more proud of his more serious projects. He did a TV series here in the UK called Edge of Darkness, which was eventually remade as a feature film with Mel Gibson in about 2007, 2008. But Troy would write these very political pieces of work. He was very involved in politics.

It meant a lot to him. And I think that when he wrote this, the serious undertones of the Italian job was something which I think he felt the director lightened a little bit when he came to make the movie. And what I mean by that is that Troy saw this as a dark political thriller. It was a point in the UK where we were about to go into the common market. As you know, we've just left Europe with Brexit, so we're no longer part of the European Union anymore. But this film was written just as we were going in,

and it was just as big of a debate back then as to whether we should join the European Union as it was when we left it a few years ago. And I think that he wanted it to be a much tougher movie, and I think the campier, more comedic elements, which people loved the film, was something that he felt maybe watered it down somewhat. cast people like Benny Hill, who I don't know how much he would mean to your listeners in America, but over here, he was a big personality from the 60s, even through to the early 1990s. So I think that element of it was something that he felt was ruined in the movie by that type of casting. And the interesting story about the ending, which I think you were alluding to just then, is that Troy would admit himself, he just hadn't come up with a really good ending. which I think you were alluding to just then, is that Troy would admit himself,

he just hadn't come up with a really good ending. And I don't want to spoil the film for audiences, but you finish the film with an amazing car chase across the rooftops, through the sewers, and through the piazzas of Turin. And they're left in this predicament, literally this cliffhanger ending. And that was, that was, well, can we talk about that or should we hold it back? I mean, I don't, I don't want to ruin it for anybody who hasn't seen the film, because if I talk about this, we're going to ruin it, but I can, if you want to.

I say, let's go ahead and talk about it. I mean, most people who know the movie or, or, you know, they understand what the ending is. I mean, it's not exactly a brand new movie. So I try not to do too many spoilers, but I think in this case, it's one of the most iconic literal cliffhangers in any movie. You kind of have to talk about it. Yeah. Okay. So I quickly remind audiences, Michael Caine and the gang have completed the robbery with the three minis. They've got a half a ton of gold in the back of a coach,

and the coach is winding around the hairpin bends in the Alps. The driver loses control. The bus spins over the edge and then is balancing very precariously over the cliff. The gold is at one end and the gang are at the other. And what's going to happen, no one knows because it's literally balancing. Now, that was the idea of Michael Dealey. And he had the idea on a plane as he was going back over to see Robert Evans at Paramount to update him on the picture. Because Troy had come up with lots of talky endings. They'd ended up in a bank in Switzerland and ultimately been owned by the mafia. But they're all not very dramatic after this big car chase. And what Michael came up with was this very visual ending, this bus just literally

hanging there over the mountain. And as you said, probably one of the most famous cliffhangers in movie history. Yeah. And to go back to kind of his relationship with Troy, that whole changing of the tone is probably what makes it so well beloved in the UK because it has that UK humor. It has that UK sensibility that just is woven through it. Talk a little bit about that for our audience. about that for for our audience well absolutely i mean it does it does have that british humor which is why i think us as brits have sort of like taken it uh to our to our hearts some would say it's a bit xenophobic in places but i think you know you have to understand that we're now over 50 years since this movie when this movie was was made but one thing troy did say to me when he died when the film was just passing its 40th anniversary, and when we were working on that last collection of bonus material for the Blu-ray, he did say to me as we sat down for lunch that, you know what? The tone was right for this movie in the end.

And as you said, Tim, we probably wouldn't be still talking about it over 50 years later if they'd have made that original draft, which Troy had written. Right. Well, it's one of the other things other than the humor, which I think is great. And I love the cast and everything is the many Coopers. I mean, the car chases and all that. And your behind the scenes documentaries and everything go into that. It's pretty fascinating. Talk a little bit about how Turin was chosen and how they pulled that together. And they had the best drivers in the world, basically, behind those cars. Stay with us. We'll be right back.

Hi, this is Tim Millard, host of The Extras Podcast. And I wanted to let you know that we have a new private Facebook group for fans of the Warner Archive and Warner Brothers Catalog physical media releases. So if that interests you, you can find the link on our Facebook page or look for the link in the podcast show notes. When Dini started looking about how they were going to do the car chase, he realized he needed a city that he could control. And Milan didn't work out when they went to look at that. And in the end, they came to Turin. Now, Turin is a company town in the sense that everybody that works there and lives there works for Fiat, which was the big Italian car manufacturer. for Fiat, which was the big Italian car manufacturer. And Fiat was owned by somebody called Gianni Agnoli. And Agnoli and Michael Dealy shared a mutual friend, Lord Harlick. And Michael was explaining to Harlick one day, I've got to shoot this movie and we need to bring

a city to a standstill. I just don't know how we're going to do it. And Harlick said, well, meet Agnoli. And Dealy pitched the film to him. Now remember, in this film, the Italians don't come out on top. I mean, the Brits go in there, steal the gold, and made them look like total idiots. But I think Agnelli was kind of amused by the idea and the script. But also, he had a very good business hat on as well. He said, look, Michael, I tell you what, I've read the script. Let's take out the Mini Coopers and let's make the cars Fiat 500s, which were the equivalent in size that Fiat made at the time. He said, I'll give you all of the stunt drivers to drive them. You can smash as many as you want. I will give you $50,000

towards the making of the picture. And I'll also give you a Ferrari as a gift. And that is one heck of a proposition. But Michael knew that they had to be minis. It had to be British cars that performed this robbery. That was the whole point of them, red, white, and blue, the colors of the Union Jack. And he couldn't possibly take up that offer. But interestingly, BMC, who made the Mini at the time, you know, Michael went to see them and said,

look, you know, this is your big chance. Look at this script. This is the greatest car commercial ever made. The Minis are going to jump buildings. They're going to go down steps. They're going to go through sewers. They're going to drive through shopping arcades. They're going to go up to the back of a bus. They're the heroes of the movie. And they just could not see it. And they would not give them free cars. I mean, this was way before the era of product placement, what we see today. And eventually, they sold them six cars at trade price. And that's the best deal they could get. them six cars at trade price and that's the best deal they could get. But you know, what Fiat were offering was absolutely incredible. But I, again, just wouldn't have captured that. It wasn't, they just, that just wasn't the spirit of the movie they were trying to make.

Right. Well, talk a little bit about the, uh, the actual car chases and, and the how, I mean, they have to bring the city to a standstill because, you know, spoiler alert, part of the whole heist is the fact that we're going to create this traffic jam so that we can get away. Talk a little bit about how how did they actually do the logistics of it? Well, for the traffic jam sequences itself, for themselves, they literally created real traffic jams. Gianni Ainelli again assisted in any way he could. traffic jams. Gianni Ainelli again, assisted in any way he could. And one day the catering van blocked off one exit to the city, the wardrobe van blocked off another, the camera trap blocked off another, and they just kept the traffic coming into the city, but not letting anything

out. And then they positioned all the cameras around the rooftops. And then they were able to get this fantastic wide shot of this traffic jam sequence. I was listening to your documentary talk about it. And I'm like, no, wait, they actually literally let the people of the city. We're not talking about actors or drivers or whatever. Those were mixed in. They literally manipulated really the citizens of the city to be in the traffic jams. I mean, you couldn't do that today. I mean, it's just like kind of this amazing story, if I have that right.

Yeah, no, it's absolutely insane when you think about it. Absolutely. And I'm sure that, you know, if they'd been discovered, I mean, God only knows what would happen if those locals realized what was happening to them, especially a film that made them look like idiots, really. This wasn't looking them in a fond way. But the stunts themselves with the minis, they were performed by a team called Le Keep Rémi Julien, a French team. So it's quite interesting that this is a very patriotic British movie, but the guys driving the minis couldn't even speak a word of English. That's the irony there.

But Remy was probably... He was the best stunt driving team in Europe. He brought science to moviemaking. At that point in UK films, you just say to a stuntman, oh, can you just drive the car through that wall, please? And they would just get in and do it. There wasn't any finesse to it. There wasn't any his first real English language picture. He'd done a lot of French films, a lot of Italian films. And if you look at some of his work on YouTube, it's incredible when you look at some of the stunts he was doing in the mid-60s in European movies. And this was a great calling card for him because he went on to do about six James Bond films in the 1980s. Absolutely fantastic guy. Really, really brilliant. And yeah, I think one of the real, I think, key elements of the Italian job which make it so spectacular

is Remy Julien, is that stunt driving. You can see everything was done for real. There was no trickery. There's one scene where the three minis have to jump from one building to the other. And they filmed that inside the Fiat factory. And they decorated the rooftops with the production designer, put chimney pots around, put some washing lines up to make it look a bit more of a street scene. And the three minis had to leap from one rooftop to the other. Now, Michael Dealy was told as the producer, you do realize that if something goes wrong in this stunt, you're going to be held accountable, you personally, because you're in charge of this movie. Even if it's the fault of the stunt driver, this is your enterprise. Well, Remy Julien, he absolutely said he could do it.

And his team said it's possible. It's really as possible to do it. And they practiced on the flat. But there was obviously the danger that if the first Mini spun as it took off and it spun on its side in midair, it would bring the other two down with it because all three of them were leaping together at the same time. So Michael had to have a car with this engine running at the side door of the factory, a private jet at the airport, a Turin airport, so that if something did happen, he could get out of the country really damn quick and fight it from outside of Italy, just in case the stunt went wrong. But that's the kind of thing these guys were doing to make this film. Right. It's a great story and obviously could never pass muster today. I mean, nobody would, no insurance company would allow any of that stuff to happen. And thankfully all turned out great. The shot is amazing. And it goes down in Hollywood

lore, so to speak film history lore because of all of that background. I mean, there's so much to this film that, I mean, if you enjoy the film, that's great as a fan, it's so much fun. And I think if you're a collector of, of, uh, you know, movies and, and some of the great movies, this is one that you would want to have in your collection somewhere. But I love the package of behind the scenes stuff, because there's so much to this film that you delve into and, and, uh, your books as well. For those fans who like to read, get you know have books about behind the scenes of their favorite movies as well because this one has a lot of great stories i mean you watch it and

you think oh this is great fun they're seeing the the minis go through the uh sewer system or across the the waters uh and all these things but each one of those or even in the palazzos you know going through the shops and everything but each one of those shots has a story behind it. And then, uh, you delve into some of it, like, like the shop owner who wanted to kind of blackmail them and hold out to get paid, which is kind of fun. I thought that story is a lot of fun since we didn't, we haven't even talked about the whole mafia element to the story. Uh, but that kind of tied into, into that. I thought, let's talk a little bit about the Italian actors and the whole mafia element of the story. But that kind of tied into that. I thought, let's talk a little bit about the Italian actors and the whole mafia element of the story.

There were some pretty prominent actors that were involved in this from Italy. Well, two, I think, two really important ones. The first one was Rosanna Barazzi, who was in the opening sequence of the film. And he's the one with the master plan that he hands to Charlie Croker, Michael Caine's character, who then executes the Italian job in the story. The beginning sequence is this wonderful, very evocative number. Matt Monroe, who was a singer here in the 60s, who sung the title song on days like these and rosanna barazzi is driving this beautiful lamborghini miura which was really the first supercar i mean it's an absolutely fantastic

car and in fact during the writing of the recent book the last book i found the car that the car has been restored back to its its former glory and it's it's absolutely wonderful and then uh and then later on in the film you've got the mafia boss played by Raffaelloni, another fantastic Italian actor who just enriched the film even further. And again, I think that's down to Dealey and Collinson. I mean, Collinson deserves some credit for this because he knew what he wanted to do with this.

In fact, we should just talk a little bit about peter collinson the director because it's interesting this might be one of the the most loved british films of all time but very few people can name who directed it um and it's interesting he made a film every year from 1967 until 1980 when he died a studio picture i mean he's working, he worked with some huge movie stars. But really, apart from this, this film just overshadowed everything else that he did. And very sadly, he died at the age of 44 in Los Angeles. And I always wonder, as the Italian job would have gained more momentum, you know, what sort of career he would have gone on to have, because he was still, if you think about it, really at the beginning of

his career, you know, a director of 44 has still got so much to give, so many more stories to tell. And I'd love to have seen what he would have done. And also just to see what he would have had to have said about this film, because he never saw it earn cult status. Because when the film came out, it was deemed by Paramount to be a flop. It didn't do any business in North America. I think it lasted about a week. I always remember Maggie Bly, the leading lady in the movie. She was American. And she went to see it, I think, in Westwood the first weekend it opened. And she said that her and her friend were the only two people

sitting in the cinema. And it was a reasonable hit here. I mean, it wasn't a huge success. And it was seen as a financial loss for Paramount. It didn't make any money. And it's only been since it started to get repeat viewings every Christmas here in the UK from sort of like the mid-1980s onwards that the film suddenly started to get this cult following and this movie that we all now love

and admire. But when it first came out, it wasn't a big success. So it wasn't like suddenly every studio in Hollywood was offering Peter Connorson a three-picture deal on the back of this movie. So yeah, that was the whole interesting thing about that director. And I think that very few of his other movies people know about. But I say go and seek them out. Loads of them are out on DVD. When I say loads, he made about 15 films. There's some great ones like Up the Junction. He did a horror film called Fright with Honor Blackman, you know, who was in the Bond film Goldfinger. You know, just look up his filmography and you'll see he worked with

all of the greats of that time of the 1970s. His widow, I think, is interviewed for some of the extras. He's really funny. It adds a lot to it because, I mean, obviously she has the personal stories about Peter and they're real poignant, of course. You know, it's a sad ending there, but she really does, I think, give some insight to, to what he was thinking and feeling and the excitement that he had as a director. I mean, what a great opportunity for him. And, uh, I think it's great that you're, you're highlighting some of his career and everything and his importance to the film, because I mean, he was the director of one of these classic films. So now some of the other

things about the film that I think are pretty fun are, you know, some of the other things about the film that I think are pretty fun are, you know, some of the classic one-liners that come out of it. And maybe one of the, I think it's actually considered the top most famous line from a film comes from this film. You want to talk about that? You're only supposed to blow the bloody doors off. I'm not going to try and do a Michael Caine impression. I couldn't possibly do it. But yeah, absolutely. You know, you'll often walk around London and see people with t-shirts with that slogan on. I mean, it's huge. I mean, yeah, it is one of the most quotable lines of all time. And in the script, it was just slightly different. I think it was sort of like a quip on the day. But I think Michael Caine said,

he never thought when he said that line on set that it would follow him around forever. And I think in the documentary, he says that he had a friend over that brought his grandchildren around for Sunday lunch and knocked on the door. And this seven-year-old kid looked at him, pointed at him and said, you're only supposed to blow the bloody doors off. He said, you know, this it's followed him around for 50 years. He says, you know, you hope that people are going to go and see the film, not quote lines at you 50 years later. Right. But that is, you know, that's how, you know, you've achieved cult status with the film and kind of like you, I came to the film a little bit later, you know, but it's so enjoyable.

And I think these, these one-liners are part of the way you find out about films like this. You're like, well, now what does that reference in? What, you know, what does that mean? Or if you are, obviously you grow up there in the UK, it just kind of seeps in and, you know, you have to seek out the movie to kind of find out what is now what's the context of these one liners that permeate the culture so it's a lot of fun he uh also had his brother wasn't he cast michael cain's brother was cast in this film i think that's correct stanley cain i mean i think at that point you know stanley you know obviously saw his brother's success and thought he fancieded a bit of that glamour too. And Stanley was in a couple of films with Michael Caine, you know,

and you've got to really look for him in the Italian job, but he's there. I thought he had some, they gave him some good lines though. Like he gets to really kind of, you know, play off of his brother and some of the lines that he gets. There's a couple in there, but I mean, you know, he obviously does not have the screen presence of, of Michael Caine. Um, but he's, he's the one in that famous scene. He's the one blowing the bloody. No, no, no, no, no, no. That's, that's, that's an actor called Michael standing. Oh, okay. Okay. Okay. That's, that's not, um, that's not Stanley. Um, interestingly, just while we're on the point of Michael standing, if I may,

he was somebody I really wanted to talk to. And I looked for him for years and years and years. And when I first started work on this project back in 1999, on the first book, the internet was only in its infancy back then. So the research tools that we now have as writers and as film historians are much greater now. But back then, it was very hard to find people, very hard to find people. And I finally found him when I was researching the book in 2018 for the new 50th anniversary book. And I found him living just up the road in Los Angeles, living a very simple life away from acting in Hollywood. And he hadn't been in a film for, well, 30, 40 years. And he was delighted to share his stories.

But he'd been living in America since the early 1980s. And he really didn't have any idea as to the cult following the film had. idea as to the cult following the film had. And he was absolutely amused when I showed him murials on the side of buildings, pictures of him where people had repainted that famous scene, blowing the bloody doors off scene and things like that. And prints of him in galleries and all this kind of thing. He had no idea that any of this had gone on. All he'd been doing had been living his quiet life in California. That is interesting. Okay. So I had that wrong. He was the one that I was really thought had some great one-liners in the scenes with Michael. You mentioned how big this is in the UK. We have a number of fans of this show who listen,

who are in Australia, Canada, some of the other Commonwealth countries. Is it pretty popular throughout the Commonwealth or? No, I think primarily the UK, but you know, it, it, uh, you know, I've, I've heard from people all over the Commonwealth who, who love the movie. Um, yeah, no, absolutely. It's just, it's interesting. It's just America where people don't really seem to know about this movie. They know more about the remake, which came in 2003, which I will say, I don't think it's a bad movie. I mean, a lot of fans of the original slate the remake. I think that's very unfair because I think the Mark Wahlberg version is a great movie in its own right. I think that they're very different, obviously. The tone of the first one and the humor, all of the references to the Queen. I mean, to me as an American, very British, I enjoy it because it's very different in that way. But I enjoyed the 2003 remake as well. Now, did I read somewhere that there was a TV been in development for... The sequel to the remake was in development, the Brazilian job, after the first film came out in 2003, the one that you just name-checked there.

The TV series has been announced a couple of times. Paramount said something a couple of years ago during the pandemic that it was in development. Yes, I think it is coming. Eventually, it will come. What the premise of it's going to be and who's going to star in it. I don't know. Right. Well, it's one of those kind of perennial that's talked about. It feels like, I mean, uh, you know, I, I hear about this with a lot of other classic TV shows and classic movies as well, but, uh, you know, Hollywood is always looking for content that has a built

in fan base. And this film would sure bring some of that to any new TV series. And they need so much content for the streaming services and everything. So, you know, it'd be fun. What I really wish had happened, though, is in the commentary, I think, with Michael,

he talks about what a sequel to the original film would look like. And look, we won't spoil it. You got to listen to the audio commentary because to me, that's a good reason to have to listen to it amongst all the others we've mentioned. But I thought that sounded interesting. I think everybody I spoke to or interviewed for the piece, be it Michael Caine, Troy Kennedy Martin, the writer, and Michael, as you just mentioned there, they all had a different idea about how they got off that bus, off that coach, as we call it here. So it'd be really interesting to have seen what would have happened if they'd actually made a sequel.

But they all had these different crazy ideas. And we detail some of them in the documentary. Everybody sort of giving their explanation as to how they get off. But yeah, that would have been that would have been fun if we had had a sequel. But then on the other hand, I think the fact that the film's left there and it's a one-off and we don't know what happened is part of the charm of the Italian job. Right. So the other thing that the producer Michael Dealy talks a lot about is the importance of the music in the film. Can you talk a little bit about Quincy Jones and what he brought to the film? Yeah, I think this is another thing which I think is quite fascinating about the film. The

fact we had the French drivers doing the stunts. You had a black jazz musician doing this movie, doing the score for this film. And it's just so British at its core. And he came over to London. He was in London at the time and he met with Michael. They were in the same social circles. He was in London at the time and he met with Michael. They were in the same social circles. And he would sit there at dinner with Michael Dealey, Michael Caine. And Michael Caine would start using what we call Cockney rhyming slang. And it was used in prison so that the guards didn't know what the prisoners were talking about. And so you'd say things like, I'm going up the apples and pears, which is stairs. Daisy roots means boots you know and they were like singing all this and chanting all this and saying all this and quincy signer there and he loves this he said this is

great this is crazy and he strung all of the all that cockney rhyming slang together all this british cockney rhyming slang and wrote this song called get a bloom and move on which features at the end of the movie which is a brilliant brilliant, brilliant piece of work with lyrics by Don Black, the Oscar-winning songwriter. But yeah, that for me, I think was one of the highlights of working on this project was getting to meet Quincy Jones. And I went to his home in Bel Air to do the interview. And it was fascinating to be in this room with all the gold discs for all of the Michael Jackson albums that he produced. And he was just an absolute legend. And to be able to sit there and have a drink with him was, you know, it's one of those

memories I'll remember forever. It's a fascinating story. And, and I think in the, one of the supplements or the commentary Michael talks about, he just didn't feel that that ending the whole last third of the movie, really the, just the, some of the best stuff in the, in the film with the car chases and everything that it wasn't really because it was shot at different locations at different times and had slightly different looks. It didn't feel like it was holding together until that music was put against it.

Yeah. I think what Michael was saying is that it was very choppy. You know, the car chase was going from, was going from one location to the other, cutting inside the car to a couple of dialogue lines. And what Quincy did with his score is he really stitched that last 15 minutes of the movie together with his music. And then the name of your book, The Self-Preservation Society, I mean, that's taken

right from the song, right? Absolutely. Yeah, absolutely. That's such a memorable and iconic moment in the film that it seemed like a great title to use for the book. I wanted to call it Blowing the Bloody Doors Off, but Michael Caine just ahead of me with his autobiography the year before, and he used that title. So I thought we kind of had two books with the same title. So I went with the Self-Preservation Society, but Blowing the Bloody Doors Off would have been a great title. Yeah. Yeah. And you also wrote a book on, um, kind of going a little off tangent here, but you also wrote a book on the James Bond films. How much did the, and you kind of touched on a little bit, but how much did the car chases and the music and the tone of this film play into, uh, the Bond films that came later?

It's really interesting because a lot of fans who I meet, you know, who come up to me and say they're big fans of The Italian Job, they're also big Bond fans as well. I think there's a little bit of a crossover there because they're both these very British subjects. But, you know, the director of the later films in the 80s, John Glenn, he actually worked on The Italian job in the editing department. It was just quite early on in his career. And when he came to direct For Your Eyes Only with Roger Moore, and there was going to be this car chase, he thought,

I know the best person to do this. I'm going to get the guy I remember from the Italian job back in. And that's how Remy ended up doing the Bond films. I went to a recent... We did a podcast recently on the 60th anniversary of Dr. No and James Bond, which is being celebrated all this year. And there was a great display at the Peterson Car Museum another great exhibit would be the cars of the Italian job. But it would be a little bit more challenging because those cars are, you know, some of them are not around, of course. But you could get replicas or you could get some that reference that. Well, one thing we didn't talk about were all of the cars pushed out of the bus and pushed over the cliff and everything.

That was a great load of fun because I, I mean, who doesn't want to see things get demolished? The little boy in you, you know, that enjoys car driving and demolishing and things of that nature. That's what Michael Caine says is one of the, you know, one of the drawing factors of the film was watching this destruction of cars, of these beautiful machines. He says that people are almost more devastated when they see a beautiful machine destroyed than they do a person, seeing a beautiful Lamborghini getting thrown down the side of a cliff and into a ravine.

But in terms of the cars that survived, the Lamborghini survived. One of the E-Type Jags survived. The Aston Martin that Michael Caine drives, the DB4 convertible, that survives. And there's a beautiful set of replica minis from the movie, which tour around here in the UK. And when we launched the book, we launched it at the mini factory and we reunited all of these cars together and had them all on display either side of the screen where we screened the movie. So the audience was sitting in the room with the six cars from the film, which was great fun. But I have to say that exhibition you're talking about at the Peterson, it's interesting you mentioned that because I was very much involved in that because I'm on the board of directors of the Ian Fleming Foundation. And in our collection,

we've got over 40 vehicles that were used in the Bond films. And about half of the vehicles that you saw there in the Peterson belong to the foundation. So I was just over there in September, just before the exhibition closed, because we had a big party in there for the anniversary of the foundation, which has done a remarkable job of rescuing these Bond vehicles from all sorts of strange places around the world and put them in one place for everybody to enjoy. Yeah. And speaking of demolished vehicles, that display actually had a few that were crashed. And I thought that added a lot. They weren't all pristine cars that had been

They weren't all pristine cars that had been kept in pristine condition or restored. Some of them were from the crashed vehicles, which I thought was a lot of fun and made that a very unique exhibit. So it was a great one. So congrats to you. Thank you. And the guys at the Peterson did a brilliant job of the display. I mean, that's, you know, sometimes, you know, it's hard to display cars. It's hard to make them look good in different environments because they're, you know, they're to be driven. But I thought the guys at the Peterson that their display, their design of that exhibit was absolutely brilliant.

Yeah. What in, in referencing back the, the DB4, one of the moments where I cringe the most is, you know, spoiler alert here is when that tractor starts to push down. Over the side and onto the wall. Yeah. I just, but again, it's kind of like you say, you just feel almost as bad as if it was a character being pushed over. You're just like, no, it's such a beautiful car.

We'll just do a very quick story on that, Tim. When they came to do that scene, the car gets lifted up onto the wall by the you know by the digger and then it explodes as it as it rolls down the ravine but what happened is is the special effect went off too early and the car blew up on the wall so they didn't actually shot so what were they going to do because you know you can't just suddenly get another Aston Martin DB4 convertible for a couple of hundred pounds in Turin at six o'clock at night ready to be on set for the next day but the vehicle supervisor a guy called David Salamone who also happened to drive the red mini play the character of Dominic in the film, he went around all of the secondhand car lots in Turin

that night and found a car called Alancia Flaminio, which looked sort of like a DB4. And with close inspection, it doesn't, but to the casual eye, it probably does. And they did a little bit of trickery on the car, like removing the grill, putting some fablon over the double headlights, and they used that for the shot the next day. some fablon over the double headlights. And they use that for the shot the next day. So if you watch the film very carefully, it's an Aston Martin DB4 as it goes up onto the wall, but as it explodes and rolls down the cliff, it's a Lancia Flaminio. But that is really a geeky piece of knowledge. Yeah. And I had read that, but that's the kind of little behind the scenes. If you're interested in cars, you're interested in the car chase, you're interested in this movie. That's the kind of little tidbit that's, that's actually a lot of fun because some people would know that they would, they would say, Hey, look, you know, you freeze frame it on the, uh, on the Blu-ray or whatever, and you can get a good look to make sure, you know, is that the DB? No, it's not. So that's pretty interesting.

Well, maybe you can see if you can get some pull to get a Italian job display at the Peterson. I would definitely be in line for that. There's so many fans, I think here in LA that went to that exhibit and I could just see a natural crossover between fans of the Bond film. So if you're a fan of the Bond film, I think you'll enjoy this film if you haven't seen it, or if you're just a huge fan of films that highlight cars, car chases, and some of the best car chases in film history. This movie brings the goods, that's for sure. I think it's a great idea. I think it's a brilliant idea. Sure. I think it's a great idea. I think it's a brilliant idea. So one of the other things you mentioned, Matthew, was Paramount and Michael meeting with Robert Evans.

And he's such an iconic personality executive from that era. Tell us a little bit about their interaction. Well, they were very good friends. I mean, they went on and did another couple of films together. But of course, Robert Evans will forever be remembered for The Godfather, Rosemary's Baby, Chinatown. I mean, he was an absolute legend, but he was also such a huge personality in his own right. And I'm sure many people listening to this podcast, I don't even need to explain who he is, they would have read his incredible autobiography, The Kid Who Stays in the Picture. Probably one of the most famous books written on Hollywood of that time. And I have to say, again, getting to do this documentary, getting Mr. Evans to agree to an interview was hard, but eventually he agreed. And I think, again, like that story and that

memory of going to see Quincy Jones, going to that very famous home in Beverly Hills, Woodlands, where he lived, where so many famous film stars have been there. And the parties there are legendary. The famous house that he lost and Jack Nicholson bought back for him. he lost and Jack Nicholson bought back for him. It was incredible to actually go there. And it was like going into a museum from the 70s, even down to the cocktail cigarettes that were in a bowl on the coffee table in the living room. And then in 2019, after the book came out, I went to see Bob Evans again. I was having a drink with Peter Barth. And I just gently inquired how Bob Evans was because I knew that his health was failing him. And he said, well, you should go see him. And I said, well, he's not going to see me. He won't even remember who I am. He says, just call up and mention that I told you to call. And I did that. And I spoke to his assistant. And the next day,

I went around there. And for me, it's something which I'll always remember because he was in bed. He couldn't get up anymore. And I sat there with him for about 20 minutes and reminisced about the Italian job and about Michael Dilley and all those people from that moment. And it was a very weird moment. He had Frank Sinatra playing on a CD player

in the corner of the room. And around his bedroom there, he had these photographs of these just iconic actors, directors, film people from that time. And it was a privilege just to spend some time with such an important part of Hollywood. And, you know, I was very sad to read that he died a few weeks later. Wow. What a, what a gift for you to be able to spend that with him. And, and those last minutes, uh, thanks for sharing that story. My pleasure. Yeah. Well, Matt, it was a real pleasure having you on today to talk about The Italian Job

and your knowledge and your books and your extras on the releases are just terrific for fans. And for those of the listeners who don't know much about the film, I hope they'll check it out, this new 4K release

that's coming out soon from Kino Lorber. And thank you for coming on and talking to us today about it. It was a lot of fun. Absolute pleasure, Tim. Thanks for inviting me. Well, I hope you enjoyed the conversation with Matthew Field as much as I did. The Italian Job is a terrific film and it's one you'll want to add to your 4K collection. If you love car films, caper films, or just classics from the 1960s. And the extras we discussed that Matthew Field worked on, they just provide a wealth of behind the scenes information on the film that I found so enjoyable to just go through. And there's a lot there. And as I understand it, this new 4K includes all of the extras from both the DVD and Blu-ray releases. So I'll put up a full list of

what those are on our Facebook page, or you can go to our website at www.theextras.tv. And I'll post that information there as well as links so that you can purchase the new 4K. Now, if this is the first episode of The Extras you've listened to and you enjoyed it, please think about following the show at your favorite podcast provider. And if you're on social media, be sure and follow the show on Facebook or Twitter at The Extras TV or Instagram at TheExtras.TV. To stay up to date on our upcoming guests and to be a part of our community. And for our long-term listeners, don't forget to subscribe and leave us a review at iTunes, Spotify, or your favorite podcast provider.

Until next time, you've been listening to Tim Millard. Stay slightly obsessed. The Extras is a production of Otaku Media, producers of podcasts, behind-the-scenes extras, and media that connects creatives with their fans and businesses with their consumers. Contact us today to see how we can work together to achieve your goals at www.otakumedia.tv or look for the link in the show notes.