WTF with Marc Maron Podcast - Episode 1015 - Irwin Winkler

Episode Date: May 2, 2019

After fifty years in Hollywood producing some of the most popular movies of all time, Irwin Winkler says the question he still gets asked the most is, What does a producer do? To get the answer, Irwin tells Marc about his days running the bumper cars on Coney Island, his job as a self-described mediocre agent, and his success making movies as the studio system broke down, including culture-changing hits like Rocky, Raging Bull and Goodfellas. Plus, Irwin explains why he’s had such a great collaborative relationship with Martin Scorsese and provides some details about Marty’s upcoming movie, The Irishman. This episode is sponsored by Squarespace and Capterra. Sign up here for WTF+ to get the full show archives and weekly bonus material! https://plus.acast.com/s/wtf-with-marc-maron-podcast. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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Hi, it's Terry O'Reilly, host of Under the Influence. Recently, we created an episode on cannabis marketing. With cannabis legalization, it's a brand new challenging marketing category. And I want to let you know we've produced a special bonus podcast episode where I talk to an actual cannabis producer. I wanted to know how a producer becomes licensed, how a cannabis company competes with big corporations, how a cannabis company markets its products in such a highly regulated category,

and what the term dignified consumption actually means. I think you'll find the answers interesting and surprising. Hear it now on Under the Influence with Terry O'Reilly. This bonus episode is brought to you by the Ontario Cannabis Store and ACAS Creative. Lock the gate! Alright, let's do this. How are you, what the fuckers? What the fuck buddies? What the fucksters?

What the fuckadelics? What the fuckaholics? What the fuck publicans? What the fuckocrats? How's it going? What's happening? I am, uh, this is my podcast, WTF. I'm Mark Maron. I didn't forget who I was. I'm just starting. There's a lot going on right now. Today on the show, Erwin Winkler. Erwin Winkler is a film producer, like an amazing film producer. And when I got the opportunity to talk to him, I was like, of course. And he's got this book coming out. It'll be out. You can pre-order it. It's a life and movie stories from 50 years in Hollywood comes out May 7th. But he basically goes from movie to movie that he's been involved with. And there's some great movies, and it's a very readable book.

I'm not really selling the book, but it's one of these situations where I did read it in order to talk to him. You know, the movies this guy did from the very beginning. I mean, he's been at it a long time, but he did, what would you know? They Shoot Horses, Don't They? Early on, he did that. Point Blank with Lee Marvin. The Alcatraz. That's a good movie.

Yeah, Winkler did that. He did Rocky. He's done a lot of the Scorsese films. Raging Bull, he produced. He produced Round Midnight, which I didn't get to. We were bouncing around. I had about an hour and 15 minutes. But he did some of those bronson movies breakout a lot of these stuff that the gambler with james conn the original one tobac movie great movie but he just uh so true

confessions a you know that is a movie that that uh is great that people don't really uh give it the respect it deserves he directed um guilty by suspicion with the near anyways he's he's the real deal hollywood guy and he does it the old school way and it was great to talk to him so that's coming up but i feel all right do i sound all right all right i'll be honest with you i'll be honest with you drink some coffee today and i haven't drank coffee in a long time. And I made some coffee. I made some white roast. I made some, you know, like, yeah, I'm drinking it right now. Pow!

Look out. Just shit my pants. Just coffee.coop. That's a classic ad that I made up and I didn't have to do. But, yeah, I drank some coffee today. And I'm not going back to it. But I just, my buddy came over. He wanted some coffee. I made some coffee. I figured I'd have some coffee today and I'm not going back to it. But I just my buddy came over. He wants some coffee.

I made some coffee. I figured I'd have some coffee, see what that does. And I don't think you can notice any difference. Can you notice any difference? There's not much difference in the way I'm talking because I'm drinking coffee. Is there? I mean, there's a difference between tea and coffee, but you can't tell from how I'm talking, can you? I exaggerated that.

Hey, but yeah, so I've been doing some reading. I think I want to share the name of this book with you, like I usually do. But I don't know who laid this on me. I think it was one of you guys. It's called Fantasyland, How America Went Haywire, A 500-Year History by Kurt Anderson. Maybe some of you have read this already. It's been on the bestseller list. Maybe some of you have read this already. It's been on the bestseller list. And I rarely take real time to sit and read, and I've been making myself do that. Because you know why? Because I like to read, and it's a nice thing to do, and I don't make time for anything. or I'm running around doing dumb errands or necessary errands or I'm cooking, which isn't

bad either. Cooking, reading, listening to country music is how I'm managing right now. And I don't need to manage. I mean, I'm okay. You know what I mean? I just took some taters out of the oven. Yeah. And that's not code. I actually took some taters out of the oven. I got a purple sweet potato. I got a yam, an orange sweet potato. I got a Japanese sweet potato, and I got a regular sweet potato. And that's how I roll. Four different kinds of sweet potato. I bake them.

I cut them up. I pop them in my mouth when I'm feeling peckish. That and cashews, maybe an almond or a date. Yeah, that's how I'm living right now. That's it. Country music, some powerful jazz. I'm reading a book and I'm snacking on potatoes and nuts. All right. You got a problem with that? And I'm thinking about things and I'm feeling my feelings. The book is great. The book Fantasyland. It really is this overarching sort of examination of the American spirit

in terms of our propensity towards magical thinking and living in a fantasy going back to before America was settled to original pre-Puritan religious groups that came here looking to establish

a righteous community uh it was originally based in religion and then he just moved through all of it i'm just right now i'm halfway through the book we're in the 70s we're into conspiracies we're into disneyland we've moved through pentecostalism and we've moved through pt barnum we've moved through a lot of stuff man but the book is compelling as hell. It's readable as hell. And it does give you a sense of the nature of the individual and the deterioration of our belief in reason and science. Not mine, but you know, the neighbors, the weird neighbors. There's a historical precedent to this president's impact on the

fragile brain of the magically thinking hordes. It's not going to make you feel better. It might make you realize that we were going to land here anyways, but there's no answers. There's no solutions. You know, fantasy, magical thinking, it's definitely ahead right now. And Lord knows, Lord knows, see, magical thinking, you know, if that wins, what is the fantasy exactly? It's not going to be the world that I fantasized. Yeah, it's going to be a lot more singular, a little more myopic, which is a diplomatic word for, you know fascism maybe i don't want to throw that word around let's just say uh bad how's bad is bad good just took some taters out of the oven hot taters downstairs i got a few different types of hot taters

yep that's how i'm living. Looking forward to slicing them up, maybe eating a piece. I like sweet potatoes. Don't you? I think they're good for me. I've decided that. It's not based on bullshit though, is it? How do we know what we know?

What isn't bullshit? Look, man, I don't know who you think you are or what you think you're doing, but if whatever your life is built on in terms of a job, seriously, if what you're doing doesn't involve math on some level there's some bullshitting involved let's just be honest with ourselves you know it might be bullshitting for the right reason it might be righteous bullshitting but uh we are

built to bullshit folks it's how we survive and i you know you know, God knows, listen to me, what's tumbling out of my face, huh? What is it? What was I going to tell you about? Oh, yeah. The Buddhism trip continues. And it's actually starting to have an effect on me. As some of you, if you're just joining our conversation, I made some comments that were funny, actually, about Buddhism.

But some people took offense. Some people took hostile offense. Hostile Buddhists. A good friend of mine and my sponsor and a respected psychologist and writer, Dr. Steve, also a Buddhist. We've had some conversations. Got no problem with Buddhists, but somehow I pissed some Buddhists off and other Buddhists came to my defense. But this one sort of fleshes it out a little better. A little better. This is the Dukkha comedian subject line. Mark, I'm a longtime lover of the show.

Two thoughts. One, the Brene Brown chat was important. You have a knack for engaging with social scientists and thinkers. Yes, continue bringing in the stars, but your inner philosopher and psychologist seems to roam most free when you're connecting with people like Brene. Two, you've received several points of feedback on the Buddhism comment from the Vincent D'Onofrio episode. While I find the situation hilarious and know you don't need another perspective, I do think you've overlooked the root cause of your audience's reaction. You likely have quite a few casual and committed Buddhist fans. This is because, like it or not, you're the dukkha podcaster and comedian. Now, initially when I read that,

that didn't sound good. Too close to dukkhi, but it's spelled differently. D-U-K-K-H-A. Didn't know what it was. Now we get the explanation. Dukkha is the Buddhist concept of suffering and pain, and the fact that much of life's mundane experiences are unsatisfactory. Now, many, if not most, comedians focus on suffering and draw their material from it. But you go deep into the depths of dukkha. I'm a dukkha deep diver. Deep into the depths of dukkha. Many of your podcast intro monologues are you sharing the struggle of your mind, generating and recognizing suffering on a second-by-second basis, and you share this process with a degree of transparency and honesty like no other. In Buddhism, this is not a wasted process.

This is the first crucial step. You hear that, Buddhists? I'm dukkhaha man. Yeah, I'm the Dukkha guy. I'm living in Dukkha. And Dukki, by the way. The cycle of attempting to attain that which is fleeting and ultimately empty of any value. This craving concept is often the basis of your addiction recovery dialogue with guests. Lastly, in a nutshell, Buddhism says the majority of our problems are created by us, our perspective, the inner movie in our minds, and not the actual outside world. So just let go, lovingly engage with the world around you, and do the actual outside world. So just let go. Lovingly engage with the world around you and do the best you can. Pretty sure I've heard you hit on this exact concept

during several conversations with guests. Mark, you're pretty damn Buddhist. Accept it. Apologies on the sermon. Keep speaking your truth. Best, Joe in Seattle. So there you have it, my Buddhist detractors. Looks like I was unconsciously being of assistance to the concept and practice of Buddhism

and apparently at the first step and moving through some other ones. I'm not yet at the, how eightfold, is it the eightfold path? See, that sounds like a hell of a path. But right now I'm sitting in dukkha and a certain amount of mental dookie. Okay? So I think that ends it. I think I'm going to take that as closure on the Buddhist situation. All right?

We good? I feel pretty good. Hot taters downstairs. Folks, listen, if you want my tour dates, there's a lot coming. Go to WTFpod.com. I'll plug them specifically another day. There's always time for that. What else have I got to tell you?

I'm also going to have some upcoming dates where you can see Sword of Trust, the movie I'm in, directed by Lynn Shelton. That's going to happen. It's getting a release. Real movie out in the theater. I'm in it. Exciting. Exciting?

How about exciting? Exciting? Exciting. Exciting. Holy fuck. Yeah, coffee's not a great idea for me. So Erwin Winkler came over. He's in his 80s.

He's sharp as a tack. I just wanted to hit the movies and learn about how he got into the business. He's been a producer for 50 years. And we talk about some of your favorite movies, my favorite movies. We got a lot in. So this is also he's got this book coming out, A Life in Movies, Stories from 50 Years in Hollywood. Comes out May 7th. And it's an easy read.

Just a few pages on each movie he was involved with. Like a good story on each movie he was involved with. And there's a lot of movies. So this is me talking to a producer, Erwin Wink. Hi, it's Terry O'Reilly, host of Under the Influence. Recently, we created an episode on cannabis marketing. With cannabis legalization, it's a brand new challenging marketing category. And I want to let you know we've produced a special bonus podcast episode where I talk to an actual cannabis producer. I wanted to know how a producer becomes licensed, how a cannabis company competes with big corporations, how a cannabis company markets its products in such a highly regulated category,

and what the term dignified consumption actually means. I think you'll find the answers interesting and surprising. Hear it now on Under the Influence with Terry O'Reilly. This bonus episode is brought to you by the Ontario Cannabis Store and ACAS Creative. It's a night for the whole family. Be a part of Kids Night when the Toronto Rock take on the Colorado Mammoth at a special 5 p.m. start time on Saturday, March 9th at First Ontario Centre in Hamilton.

The first 5,000 fans in attendance will get a Dan Dawson bobblehead courtesy of backley construction punch your ticket to kids night on saturday march 9th at 5 p.m in rock city at torontorock.com where where you live on the west side? Yeah, Beverly Hills. Yeah, forever? Yes, since we came out in 1966.

My wife, when we came out, said, listen, because what happened is I left New York, came out here. She had to rent the apartment that we lived in in New York and take care of the kids. So she said, two things I want, a convertible and a house in Beverly Hills, because she was born right outside of Beverly Hills. That's right. She comes from sort of a show business family. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Woodrow.

Yeah. And did you know her parents? No. No? You didn't? No. No. We met in New York when she had moved to New York.

You've been in the business, is it over 50 years now? Yeah. Well, 53 years. And I found it fascinating, like right out of the gate in the book, that I think what was really interesting is your awareness, obviously you would be aware as a producer, of how the business changed. You know, how it changed in five or six stages in the book. You talk about the landscape of the business.

But even right when he got out here, that was a huge shift when they the it was in the midst of its big change here because the government broke up the monopolies exactly and television came along people stopped going in the movies and started watching television so the studios really sees cease to exist as they were known they no longer had actors on the contract, directors on the contract. When I went on, the first time I walked on the MGM studios, they had a psychiatrist, which they needed, by the way. A psychiatrist for what? For the actors to talk to or the executive.

No, but they had everything. They had a dentist. Oh, I see what you're saying. They had a school. It was a whole city. They controlled everything in your life if you were assigned to them. That's interesting. It's like any other industry town that was built to service a particular industry.

Yeah, that's an interesting, yeah, like Ford Motor Company would go into a city, build a factory. That's right. And own everything around it. They rented the houses to the workers. Yeah, that's interesting. It made an enclosure. DuPont, I think, did that in some areas. And I know that even MetLife did the Syverson Town in New York City.

But in England, when they did these rural communities where they would build the coal mine, for instance, the coal company would own the houses that the people lived in. They would own the grocery store that the people shopped in. The doctors would work for them and not for the individual patients. They owned everything. It was kind of interesting. I think that you do a really good job at balancing in the book and in your life

the idea that this was an incredibly big business, but it also had the glamour and the excitement of making dreams. It's a dream factory. Yeah, that's what they called them. They called them dream factories and for a reason. So where did you come from originally? I came from Coney Island. Way back, Coney Island.

Coney Island and my first job really, which was part-time, was working on the boardwalk in Coney Island. And it was show business in its purest form. Sure. What happened is I worked in a bumper car amusement place, where the cars banged into each other. And my job was to separate them.

and my job was to separate them. So I guess maybe that helped me in my later dealing with actors, separate everybody from being angry at each other and fighting with each other. So back then, have you been down to Coney Island lately? I haven't been there for years. My mother lived there until she died, and that was about 20 years ago. And so we hadn't gone back since. But I remember, you know, hanging around Nathan's Hot Dog Stand and all that stuff yeah that was where i grew up i talked to you was i think mel brooks

is from there yeah mel brooks is from brooklyn and i i probably coney island yeah and woody allen too yeah so nathan's is still there with their hot dogs you like a nathan's hot dog still yeah actually there's now a nathan's uh kind of a mobile Nathan's stand on Central Park South and Fifth Avenue in Manhattan. I remember they tried to make a chain out of it. I don't know if it ever took. Well, it's a mobile chain. Right. A truck.

A little stand, yeah. Yeah, yeah. But you think it's still a good hot dog? It's okay, yeah. It's just nostalgia. I think the old ones were great because they probably never cleaned the grill so the hot dogs were cooking in fat for about 20 years and i bet you they still had the real pig casing on it like there was a snap to it you know what i mean so what so when did you so but you didn't uh it wasn't your first job show business right you

you went i was show business bumper cars sure sure and you saw the freak shows and the barkers absolutely and that was definitely the beginning of uh but what did you how did you learn how to I was show business bumper cars. Sure, sure. And you saw the freak shows and the barkers. Absolutely. And that was definitely the beginning of it. But how did you learn how to do what you did? Where did you go from that? Well, when I graduated from, I went to college in New York, went to NYU. And when I graduated, I was looking for a job. And I read a book.

And in the book, there was a description of an agent. It kind of sounded interesting. And I knew a guy as I was growing up that was a tall guy. And he always wore a black suit and a white shirt and a tie. And his name was Danny Welks. And he was an agent at MCA. And I thought, well, that guy looks so good wearing that black suit. Yeah. So I didn't know.

And I went up to MCA and went looking for a job. MCA at the time was the big, big agency. And I didn't know and I went up to MCA and went looking for a job MCA at the time was the big big agency and I didn't know anything the guy asked me in New York

in New York the guy asked me all kinds of questions I had no idea what he was talking about and of course he didn't hire me but I guess

to get rid of me he said you should try William Morris because they were competitive and they were looking down at the William Morris agency so I said okay and I got the address and I went up for an interview at William Morris.

And sure enough, the guy asked me the same exact questions. But now I knew what not to say. So I got the job in the mailroom as a temporary for eight weeks, eight to ten weeks, while the other guys in the mailroom might have been on vacation because it was end of college. So it was mid-June into August. And that's how I started. But you had no sense of what an agent really did? Not a bit.

You like show business, though? I didn't know. I didn't even know. I was just looking for a job, and that seemed okay. Really? Yeah, if somebody else came along and offered me a job as a book publishing, I might have taken that or selling shoes. It could have gone either way.

Could have gone either way. As a matter of fact, when I was in the Army and stationed in Louisiana, I got a job in a shoe store selling shoes on Saturdays and Sundays when we weren't in camp. And you were okay with that? Yeah, I was a kid. I was doing it. It didn't matter. But you come back from that. And you were okay with that? Yeah, I was a kid. I was doing, it didn't matter.

But like you come back from the, were you in Korea? No, I was in the army during Korea, but I spent 20 some odd months in Louisiana. And then you get out and did you go back to school after that? Yeah, that's when I went back. Yeah, what happened is I was,

I graduated high school rather young. I skipped a couple of classes. And so when I went to NYU, I graduated high school rather young. I skipped a couple of classes. Yeah. And so when I went to NYU, I got into NYU out of high school. But as I say, I was like 17 going to college. And there was still a lot of ex-GIs, guys coming back from the Second World War, and they were in college under the GI Bill. So here I was as a kid. and they were in college under the GI Bill. So here I was as a kid, and all the students around me were men who had really lived through four years of war.

Yeah. Fighting the Japanese or the Germans, and here I was. So I was really out of place, and I felt very uncomfortable. And the Korean War started, and I said, you know what? I've got to get out of here. And I literally joined the Army. I was a volunteer. And I said, you know what? I got to get out of here. And I literally joined the Army.

I was a volunteer. I joined the Army and spent two years in the Army. When I got out, I was now a lot more mature. Yep. Went back to NYU. And at that point, the GIs were already gone. Right. So I felt very comfortable.

And I had a professor. I had one course I was taking because I didn't know what I wanted to do. And he was a man by the name of Leahy, Professor Leahy. Yeah. And he introduced me to American literature. Yeah. And I fell in love with John Dos Passos and John Steinbeck. Sure.

And William Faulkner, all the great American writers from the 20s and 30s. Yeah. And I fell in love with it and I started reading vociferously. And I kind of loved that area. When I got to William Morris and seeing what was going on, I really decided that that's something I kind of liked and wanted to do. And frankly, 50-some odd, well, now it's 60 years later from when I started at William Morris, I've never done anything else and never had any desire to do anything. You tell stories. Tell stories, exactly.

And that was the incentive. Yes, it was. But you didn't go directly into producing. You went into personal management? Well, what happened was I was, at best, a mediocre agent. And I'm giving myself a lot of credit. I tell you, I don't even understand what these guys do. When I read your book, you know, and I see the politics that are involved and the way decisions are made.

And, you know, on some level, there's a real racket to treating an actor like they're special. You know what I mean? It's not easy. I mean, obviously the big story. But they are special in a way. Of course. But I'm saying, like, they're just one piece of the puzzle. Obviously an important piece, right?

But it just sort of fascinates me, you know, the politics of putting these movies together and dealing with the talent and dealing. It's crazy. So how does it start for you? You go into personal management? Yeah. crazy so so how does it start for you you you you go into personal management yeah well as i say a mediocre uh agent uh i was then i got married when i was in the mail room at william morris i was making 40 bucks a week oh and uh big future yeah and uh margo my mother my wife uh her mother and father were both vaudeville performers. Yeah, right. Her mother actually played Beethoven's Violin Concerto while she was doing a backbend.

And that was her act. It wasn't enough to just play the concerto. And her father was an emcee who did a sand dance. Now, a sand dance is you would put sand on the stage yeah and he would move his feet to make music with the sand all right so you get that kind of almost like a brush on the drum exactly exactly so she came from anyhow we met you know we got married very young and uh i struggled along at william morris for six or seven years and were you like a junior agent or you i finally yeah i made it into a regular agent. Who were your clients?

No, nobody you would know because they weren't very important. As a matter of fact, that's why I was a failure as an agent. An agent is good as basically his clients. I had a couple of really broken down comedians, stand-up comedians.

Let's see, Sammy Shore. He was your client he sammy shore was one of our clients yeah and in fact that's the first time i saw barbara streisand in a club in greenwich village she was um he was the leading act and she was the opening act for uh sammy shore you know i interviewed sammy you know did you really he's still around he's out in vegas all right and we'll say hello yeah yeah well i mean I work at the comedy store all the time so I know his kids and you know Mitzi and that I'm very you know kind of preoccupied with that whole mythology of that place but I went out there and I talked to him yeah where you handle you remember Jackie

Vernon sure I love Jackie Vernon Jackie Vernon that's the slideshow the the fake slideshow that's right I love him he was one of my favorites when i was a little kid loved him so those are the kind of uh so you're going out to the clubs in new york at that time oh yeah then i and then and then i met bob charnoff uh who was handling jackie mason oh a young jackie mason didn't he get in trouble early yeah well we were there we were handling him when he got in trouble with ed sullivan what he do? Flip? He gave him a flip. He flipped a finger or something. That's exactly right. Well, what happened to Jackie, you know, comedians, when they go on television or in a nightclub,

as you well know, have a routine. Sure. They have a set routine, and they pretty well know what they're going to say next. And with Ed Sullivan, if you were on and you had a four-minute spot, you had it pretty well rehearsed, you know, where the laughs are going to be and everything else. And Sullivan to Jackie Mason,

as he was going on, said, cut it down to two and a half minutes. So here you go. And it was pretty tough. So in other words, you have to have your routine suddenly rewritten as you're heading to a live camera. live camera and get half a joke out in two and a half so he gave him the flip and that was a big scandal so anyhow Bob

handled Jackie and Jackie started doing really really well and Bob said to me you know you're not happy at William. I'm starting out with a couple of comedians. He was at William Morris as well? No, he was a manager. Bob had graduated from Columbia Law School, and he didn't want to be a lawyer. And his uncle was a booking, booked acts in the Catskill Mountain. Oh, that's great. So he had a lot of contacts with singers, dancers.

You know, his uncle had a big board. And if you drove a car, you could get a weekend's work because you would drive the dance act and the comedian or the singer. That was part of being a manager. That's right. Everyone get in. I'll pick you up. That's right. And you ended up getting work for the weekend if you had a car and drove everybody around. And you ended up getting work for the weekend if you had a car and drove everybody around.

Because in those days, you would drive up to the Catskill, to the Bosch Belt, and you'd do two shows on Friday, probably three on Saturday, and two on Sunday, and then head back into town. That was a good work weekend. That was a weekend. So he had Mason and who else? Well, Vernon. Jackie Vernon. Vernon and a couple other guys who I can't remember, nor could you. And a singer or two. Yeah.

And that was his stable. He was personal management. Yeah. And he made a couple of bucks, but he said to me, look, you have more experience in legitimate actors. And, of course, I handle a couple of producers and television people. He said, why don't we get together? And you're not happy at William Morris. I think we'd make a good partnership.

And we joined together, and we were together as partners for 17 or 18 years. In that? Well, we started in management, and then we ended up making the first, you know, 15 years of producing together.

Oh, but I thought he wasn't with you for the whole time. I mean, it was only 17, 18 years you guys were apart.

Oh, yeah? Yeah, we broke up in 1980. Oh, really? 1982, something around there. Oh, right, because he wanted

to take it easy. Yeah, he wanted to get more involved in philanthropy and all that. Yeah, yeah. And I kept wanting to. You couldn't stop. Yeah, I couldn to get more involved in philanthropy and all that. Yeah, yeah. And I kept wanting to be included. You couldn't stop.

Yeah, I couldn't stop. I still can't stop, by the way. Clearly. Yeah, I got to ask you right now, how's the cut of The Irishman look? Yeah, we saw it. Margot and I saw it. My wife Margot and I saw it about a month ago in New York. Yeah.

It's probably, I think, maybe one of the greatest gangster movies ever made. Oh, he outdid himself? Marty outdid himself. Come on. De Niro is so great. Al Pacino as Jimmy Hoffa. Joe Pesci, Ray Romano. It's got a great cast and a great story,

a great script by Steve Zalian, who is a wonderful writer. That's exciting. I tell you. And it's coming out in the fall. It's really, really great. A couple of the movies that you produced, I watch over and over again. Oh, really? Like every year.

Yeah. I mean, I watch Goodfellas at least twice a year, and I've seen Raging Bull probably 20, 30 times. Well, we're going to run Raging Bull at the Los Angeles County Museum on May 9th, by the way. And big screen. Big screen. Raging Bull.

Brand new print. Yeah. Oh, that's terrific. And I'm going to do a Q&A there as way. And big screen. Big screen. New print. Brand new print. Yeah. No, it's terrific. And I'm going to do a Q&A there as well. That's great. I love that movie. We'll get there. So, okay.

So, you're working as an agent. Obviously, you're learning how the business works on the job. Right. Right? So, you know, you're getting- But not doing well. Right. But at least you're getting that information.

Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. I'm finding out what show business was about. Yeah. So when you start up with Bob, what's the first order of business? You guys are running a personal management company. Well, first of all, I get some jobs for people and find a way to take my unsuccessful clients that I took with me from William Morris.

Who were which? Which ones? Well, one was a man you'd never know. His name was Nat Cohn. He was an English producer of low-budget films. Uh-huh. And he was so unimportant that when I left William Morris, they let me take him with me.

They were like, good luck. Nobody knew he was even gone. Yeah. And he had a group of films that called Carry On Nurse. There was a series of low-budget comedies that they made in England in the 60s, in the late 60s. Yeah. And my friend Cohen financed and produced all those films. Okay.

So I represented him. And we then met a young agent that was working at William Morris after I left, who I thought was very bright, and I asked him to come over and work for us. And that was David Geffen. And at the last minute, he decided not to work for us, but sent us another young man by the name of Elliot Roberts. And Elliot started our music division.

And that's then, so we went from handling those comics to some actors. Right. And then basically to Joni Mitchell, Crosby, Stills, and Nash.

You handled them? Yeah. Because Geffen ended up recording them. So was that relationship part of that? Well, what happened is when we started producing, Elliot left us and went to work with Because Geffen ended up recording them. So was that relationship part of that? Well, what happened is when we started producing,

Elliot left us and went to work with David Geffen, and they became partners, yeah. Oh, there you go. And then the history of music is invented. That's exactly right. Yeah. That's crazy how many of the guys in the book kind of recur, and you see everybody kind of comes up together.

And some guys fall off, but then other guys become huge. Well, yeah, because some of you never hear about and obviously you don't write about it much because you never you don't think of them but when i was in the mailroom some of the the well i i think two or three or four of them that i remember that i still see every once in a while most of them are gone yeah it was a very very famous personal manager my name bernie bril. Oh, Bernie, sure. Brillstein, great. I remember Bernie. Bernie, yeah. Because he handled guys I knew.

Oh, yeah. And he was a great, great personal manager, wonderful guy. He passed away about six or seven years ago. But Bernie was in the mailroom with me. Jerry Weintraub, who also became a very big producer, producing all the Ocean's movies. But he started out, when he left the Morris office, about the same time I left the Morris office,

he was handling, he went on, he went in to handle Frank Sinatra's big touring, Elvis Presley's big touring. He was very, very successful. And he was a friend of yours. Oh, yeah. We all hung out together. Because you talk about how the first movie you did was Elvis' movie.

That's right. But I think what's fascinating to me, what I didn't really realize about producing and about the creativity in it, was that you guys, you would take a property, a literary property, or even just a story, find a writer, find a star, find a star, find a director, find a studio, find some money. Like, I mean, that was really the job. There was no, you were a part, you were part of the whole process. Is every producer like that?

No, no. It seemed unique to me. Unfortunately not. In fact, one of the reasons I wrote the book is because over the years, people said to me, hey, what does a producer really do? Right. And the truth of the matter is the producer could do everything, could be everybody, including, I don't know,

Madonna's hairdresser's brother, who somehow became the producer of some movies. Just gets a credit for no reason. Yeah, exactly. Right. So, but, and then there are producers like Bernie Brustein or Jerry Wancher or myself or Brian Grazer, who I know you had on the show, who are real producers. And that function is different.

That's when a guy walks into your office and says, you know, I got an idea for this and this. And you say, yeah, yeah, that's not bad. Let's kind of work on that work with him and he writes the script and then you rewrite the script

and then you say how are we going to cast it and the guy says well no I got a star in it and then you go I don't know

if he can and it's Rocky and then you got to figure out how to get rid of that guy but not make him mad actually the case in Rocky is just that.

Stallone came to see Bob Charnoff and I as an actor, but we didn't have a part for him. And, you know, after we chatted for a few minutes and he left the office, as he was leaving, he said, Oh, by the way, and I'm not going to try to imitate Sly. He said, Oh, by the way, I'm a writer. Oh, yeah? Well, you know, he didn't look like a writer. He didn't sound like he said oh by the way i'm a writer yeah oh yeah well you know he didn't look like a writer didn't sound like a writer didn't walk like a whatever a writer does and walks like yeah who knows and he said if i send you a script would you guys read it yeah so he sent us a script and we thought the writing was really really good but it was not something we wanted to do so we said to him uh we called him back and said hey you know we

think you're a good writer but frankly this is not a script we're interested in doing it he and he was like an out-of-work actor who was dying for a job he just done uh lord the flatbush probably yeah that's that's why we saw him because he he was very good at the rubber band didn't work Stanley okay so he said I you know he grabbed the hook and he said well if you really like my writing I got another idea can I come in and talk to you about it. Yeah. So he came back and he pitched the idea of Rocky and we thought it was a kind of nice little story. Sure. And he said you know what I'll write the script for nothing you don't have to pay me. Right away it sounded good by the way. Yeah. said, however, there's one problem.

Right. He said, not a problem. He said, if you like the script and you want to make the movie, I have to star in it. So we said, well, we've got nothing to lose. If we don't like the script, it didn't cost us anything. We're not paying him. Right. And if we like the script and we star in it, okay.

So he gave us about half the script. We gave him notes, sent back our notes. He finished the script rather quickly. And then we said, okay, it's a nice little movie. We can make it for short money and all that. And you had a deal, right? And we had a deal at the studio at United Artists. And we said to them, okay, we're going to make this little movie with Stallone and all that. They said, wait a minute, wait a minute. You want to make a fight movie.

Women don't go to see fight movies. Nobody goes to see fight movies. And you got an ugly guy and an ugly girl, so two ugly ducklings. Who's going to want to see two ugly ducklings kissing on the screen? Sure. And you want to shoot it in Philadelphia. Nobody goes to Philadelphia anymore. And then they said, wait a minute, you want to star who?

Yeah. Sylvester Stallone? We hate that name even. Why would you want to? So we said, well, that's what we were. Now we were just getting really, really angry. Yeah. Because we said, wait a minute, all those reasons that you gave us, those are good reasons to make a movie.

Because what happens is if you listen to all the brilliant people out there who tell you this is the way to do it, this is the way to do it, they're always going for the lowest common denominator. Yeah, to make a buck based on bucks they've made. And by the way, they said at the end of the movie, he loses. Yeah. That's terrible. So they're all kind of, okay. So we got really, I'd say, angry and determined. But politically, you were in a good position because of the deal, right?

Yeah. We had a deal that where if we didn't make a movie within a certain period of time, we could put what they call put them to him. In other words, make him forced to make a movie at a certain price. Sure. And the price was a million and a half dollars, which today would be, I guess, eight or nine million dollars. And so what they did, and that really got us angry, they did a budget on it themselves. And they said,

well, the picture is two million dollars, therefore it's no longer under the million and a half dollar maximum. So we said, okay, in that case, we'll make it for a million dollars and we'll guarantee any overages. And they said, wait a minute, you don't have any money. How are you going to guarantee overages? So we kind of wrote a personal note. We put up everything we had to guarantee whatever overages there were. As it turned out, there were like only $25,000 in overages.

So then they were forced to make the movie, and they reluctantly made the movie. But they thought they were making it with a different guy. They thought Stallone was, I forgot the guy's name, another character. From Lords of Flatbush? From Lords of Flatbush, yeah. Oh, because they went to see,

you brought him in to see the movie. That's right. And they said, wait a minute, that's the guy? They made the movie with the wrong guy. The amazing thing to me about that story is that, you know, this is studios involved, and where were they doing during shooting? They just, you guys went and did your thing, they had other work to do, and then you shot them.

Actually, United Arts at the time was very, very producer friendly. Yeah. So they trusted you. They trusted us. Their attitude was, if we don't trust you, we shouldn't give you the money to make the movie. And is that the one they stifled distribution on? Well, they wanted to, yeah.

But by the way, the same guys at that time made One Flew Over the Cuckoos next to Annie Hall. They had a whole string of films where they trusted the filmmakers. So we made the movie, and they looked at it, and they sent me a letter saying, you know, we think it's okay, but we want to remind you that we have the right to just sell it right to television and not to theatrical. So we went through a whole process of getting a theatrical release and all that stuff, and there you go.

And Adelton directed it? Yeah, what happened was we were looking for a director that could do a quick movie. Yeah. We didn't think it was going to be this, I didn't think that I'd be sitting

50 years later talking about it here or 40 years later talking about it. Yeah, after like, now what, six or seven sequels of some kind?

Eight. Eight. With seven sequels. It's the eighth one, yeah. Yeah. And we're planning another one with Michael B. Jordan. The gift that keeps going, giving. Yeah. I's the eighth one, yeah. And we're planning another one with Michael B. Jordan. The gift that keeps going, giving.

Yeah. I enjoyed the movies. I liked Creed. Thank you. But, Ableton, what struck me was that you knew him from a- Yeah, what happened was we had done a really bad movie that we had to reshoot three weeks. Which one? It turned out it was called Believe in Me with Michael Saracen

and Jacqueline Bissett oh the druggie movie yeah it was a druggie movie that didn't really work and we convinced the studio because the studio came down on you because of the content

exactly it might have worked if you had been allowed it never would have worked I know you're being kind but it never would have worked alright so you knew him from that

he helped you out. He came in in a pinch. He did a good job for us. And what we wanted, somebody who was fast and could really get it done quick. And we hired Avilson, and he did a terrific job. And the rest is history. And the rest is history. Well, let's go back before that, because I'm really kind of fascinated with the shift in that, you know, I know we don't have all day, and you've done a lot of movies.

with the shift in that, you know, I know we don't have a, you know, all day and you've done a lot of movies, but, you know, in the period from like 67 to say, you know, all the way, you know, through up to Rocky, you know, that was the era of the American auteur, right? The studio system had broken down. Completely. And then you had these guys that had a point of view, directors, and you guys kind of locked into that. But I think like what I wanted to say before is that you know i didn't realize until reading this book and i know there's not a lot of guys like you but a lot of times the the creative impetus for certain movies you know is all on the producer if you if you're a guy like yourself you find a book and you're like this could be something we know a guy that can write this why don't we see how to do a script see what we can do like it starts with you in a lot of ways.

Yes. Well, the Rocky story is one, but even, even the, the strawberry statement, right? Yeah.

The strawberry statement, which is a film really about, really, and it's worthwhile seeing because it really is a picture of what was going on in America in the late 60s

during the height of the youth movement and the conflict in Vietnam. But, yeah, what we would do in that case, we would found a story that was in New York Magazine or tipped off about a story in New York Magazine because we knew the editor and hired a writer to write the screenplay, convinced the studio to finance it and cast it and make the movie.

And what about like they shoot horses, don't they? I just watched that because I interviewed Jane. That movie was so weird and so good and so uncomfortable, but it seemed like that was a real like hands-on training of putting something together like that for you. That was complicated, yeah. Because like, you know, the way it all came together now did you find that property as well no that one what happened is we kind of started by by a second or third movie we're

starting to make up an impression we had done the second movie we did was a movie called point blank with uh great movie great movie terrific movie yeah. Terrific movie. Yeah, yeah. John Borman. Yeah, John Borman. And that enhanced our... But John Borman is an interesting story. We had a kind of very loose relationship with John Borman through that English producer I had mentioned earlier, Nat Cohen.

All ties together. Yeah. So when we got the script of Point Blank, we kind of were looking for a star that was really tough because it was written by, it was based on a Richard Starr character who was a pseudonym for Donald Westlake, who was a great, great mystery writer. Yeah. And it's a really tough character. And we thought, you know, most of the tough characters always want to be liked, even Humphrey Bogart. As tough as he is, you want him always to like him. Yeah. Edward G. Robinson.

Sure. Jimmy Cagney. Yeah. You're rooting for the bad guy. So we wanted a guy who was really bad. Really bad. Horrible. And Lee Marvin had kind of an aura about him at the time.

Oh, yeah. So we said, how do we get a hold of Lee Marvin? We called the Lee Marvin's agent, who wouldn't even call us back. No kidding. So we did these, I mean, we were that crazy at the time so we said you know what we'll do let's get it to this guy John Borman who had only done one little movie in England which was like a Beatles kind of movie it was called catch me if you can with the Dave Clark fire it was about these rock and

roll guys running around England in the late 60s right so he said you know what we're gonna this is what we'll do. Lee Marvin is making the Dirty Dozen in England. So we called up John Borman and said, hey, John, we're going to send you this script. You read it. If you like it, you find Lee Marvin. We didn't even know where he was staying. You find Lee Marvin.

He's in London someplace doing the Dirty Dozen. And if you can get him, have him read the script. And if you read the scripts and like it, convince him that you should direct it. When you think about it, this is a rather ridiculous thing. But we didn't know better, really. All we knew was that we liked the script, we wanted Lee Marvin, and the agent wouldn't call us back.

And sure enough, one day the phone rang. It was his agent who never called us back saying, hey, you guys lee marman just called and he said he liked that script of yours and uh i'm sorry i didn't call you back but he wants to do your movie but he wants to do it with john with john boorman oh it worked out plan what that was the other thing about reading these stories is that like the the length you guys would go you're flying all over the fucking world to have a meeting. Right.

Absolutely. To try to get it. That was the exciting part of the life, right? Absolutely. Also, as I say, a moment ago, we didn't know any better. We just went straight ahead. We just kind of. But I think that was the nature of the time, right?

Everything was free. Everything was in chaos. It was a wild west. The system had broken down. Nobody knew what was going on. But there was still money there, and there were guys there, and they needed to make movies. Exactly. And after Easy Rider, you're like, well, we're going to have to tap into this thing.

And we know we can't make another Doris Day kind of movie. It's over. We need to do something different. But I think what really struck me as something that you could do at that time and you weren't afraid to do all the way through Rocky, which was antithetical to the studio system, was you didn't have happy endings necessarily. You had human endings, right? Like the New Centurions,

which is, I think, an unsung great movie. Thank you. Yeah, I do too. But it also ends in tragedy. Yeah, it's terrible. How about they shoot horses, ends up with James Finlayson put a bullet in my head. Yeah, but that was the time. Yeah, terrible. How about they shoot horses ends up with when Jane Finer said put a bullet in my head. Yeah, yeah.

But that was the time. Yes, exactly. Because the country was existentially challenged. It was, you know. Well, the Vietnam War, the ending of Strawberry Statement

is because of our music background, we got John Lennon to give us, and Paul McCartney to give us Give Peace a Chance. And it ends up

with a police riot on a campus where they kill a kid. Yeah, so this was the new Hollywood. It was you guys were producing and guys like Hal Ashby and Scorsese was starting out and Rafelson and all those cats, right? Yeah, Bogdanovich and Billy Friedkin. He's a hell of a storyteller. Oh, yeah, he's great.

He's a great filmmaker, too. Great guy. I just watched The French Connection again. It still holds up, yeah. It's great. He's a great filmmaker, too. Great guy. I just watched The French Connection again. It still holds up, yeah. It's still great. Yeah. But I guess, and you did,

I didn't realize you did the original Gambler. That was the tricky one, huh? Yeah, yeah. Toback and those guys? Yeah, well. Who directed the original? A man by the name

of Kyle Rice. Oh, yeah, right. Who went on, he made some really, really French lieutenant's woman? French lieutenant's woman, Meryl Streep. Right, right, yeah. But before that, he made some really, really... French Lieutenant's Woman? French Lieutenant's Woman, Meryl Streep. Right, right, yeah.

Yeah, yeah. But before that, he had done a couple of the English working class kind of movies. He was an interesting man. He was married to a woman by the name of Betsy Blair, who was married to Gene Kelly at one time. No kidding. Yeah. I've always liked the Gamble, the original one. I did, too.

I thought it was a great movie. By the way, you sometimes listen to the music of it. Mahler's First Symphony is the primary source of too. I thought it was a great movie. By the way, you sometimes listen to the music of it. Mahler's First Symphony is the primary source of music. Oh yeah? Yeah. But then I guess really everything changes. I remember seeing Breakout. It's so funny because so many of these movies

I'm 55. So these were grown up movies when I was a kid. And I remember seeing the posters for them. I remember seeing Breakout with my parents. Yeah, with Bronson. Sure, my dad liked Charles Bronson, right? Yeah, we did a couple of movies with him. I remember seeing Breakout with my parents, you know, with, yeah, with Bronson. Sure, my dad liked Charles Bronson, right? Yeah, we did a couple

of movies with him. Yeah, I mean, you got him after, you kind of mentioned in one of the stories that he had kind of figured out how to be a little more charming and a little funnier.

Yeah, well, in Breakout, he's kind of, yeah, yeah. But I guess Rocky really is the beginning of the shift in the business

towards blockbuster movies, right? Well, it was Rocky. It was Jaws. Yeah. It was French Connection. Yeah. And certainly The Godfather. So all of them kind of came in that period, you know?

What was the story about The Godfather, about the gangster movie in the book? Who was it that couldn't do a gangster movie? When I was doing The Gang That Couldn't Shoot Street, it was written by Jimmy Breslin. And I was looking for a director, so I got a call from an agent and said, I have an idea for you.

How about Francis Ford Coppola directing The Gang That Couldn't Shoot Street? And what had he done up to that point? He had done Finian's Rainbow and a couple of other films like that. And I said, now, why in the world would I hire Francis Ford Coppola to do a gangster movie? And instead of doing my movie, he did The Godfather, probably the greatest gangster movie he made.

You got to laugh about that. Well, when did the relationship with Martin Scorsese begin? Because, I mean, you did several. You did New York, New York. You did Raging Bull. You did Goodfellas. Goodfellas. And now-

I did Wolf of Wall Street. I did Silence. And now The Irishman. So how does that begin? Because you were working with De Niro with the gang that couldn't shoot straight. Yeah, I did De Niro who did the gang that couldn't shoot straight. And what happened was I had seen Mean Streets at the New York Film Festival. And I thought it was really terrific.

And he and I had a coffee together afterwards and just chatted. And he was a big fan of Point Blank. As a matter of fact, in Mean Streets, he uses the poster of Lee Marvin and Point Blank in a scene. So I was very interested in him because I thought, how did he even know about Point Blank in a scene. So I was very interested in him because I thought, how did he even know about Point Blank? So we got together, we had a drink, and we kind of got friendly very quickly.

And then I got a call from his agent and said, Marty had read in one of the trade papers that I was doing this big band musical called New York, New York. And he loved that era, loved the music of it, loved the whole story about it. He loved the big MGM musicals that were made by Vincent Minnelli. That's what you grew up with, right?

Yeah. And he'd like to talk to you about it. And we talked and I was thrilled because I was talking to actually the Gene Kelly about directing it. And then I realized that the story needed a modern thought to it because it was too traditional not only was the big band era traditional the music was somewhat for this yeah I needed somebody who could really shake up the story and I thought okay humanize it like make it tougher yeah make it tougher because it was too soft it was the story is about a man and a woman who were together.

Did you say it was loosely based on an act you had seen? Yeah. What happened is when Bob Chonf and I were in the management business, we handled a very, very good cabaret singer by the name of Felicia Sanders. And her husband was her pianist and accompanist. And he was a great, great piano player. Great piano player. But she was kind of between the two of them,

she was the one that brought in the money. Yeah. And he had whatever ambition he had as a pianist was subjugated to playing little ditties behind Felicia Sanders because that's how they made their living. And I was struck by what their relationship must have been and how, whether he was jealous of her success, yet he loved her and he suppressed all his talent for her. And I don't know that she ever really appreciated him or what he did. And that's what gelled in your mind as a story?

Exactly. That's what caused the story to be. And that's why I hired somebody to write the story based on my experience with Felicia Sandler. So it's not quite A Star is Born because he never becomes a star. Exactly. It's the opposite of A Star is Born. Yeah. And she never really reached the heights.

But you're right. It's the guy that suppressed his talent. And that was the kernel of it. So that's sort of a sad, tough story. By the way, you're talking, what does a producer do? That's one of the things. You have this idea.

Right, that's what I mean. And it starts with you. Yeah, and I hired a guy by the name of Earl MacRausch. The only reason I hired him is because I read some script that he wrote. He had never written anything that he made. But I made a cheap deal with him. I didn't have a lot of money, so I got him script that he wrote. He had never written anything that he made, but I made a cheap deal with him.

So I didn't have a lot of money, so I got him to do it cheap. Anyway, so Scorsese liked the idea, and he liked the script. And he brought the toughness to it. And then... But it was a hard sell, a musical, in 1977. Well, what happened was we had a little heat

because of Rocky. Yeah. So this came right after Rocky, right on top of it. How do you feel about that decision now? Yeah, pretty good. You do? Well, I mean, what happened was things came out of each other in a way. Yeah.

Because while we were doing New York, New York, Bob DeNiro was walking around with this book all the time called Raging Bull. Right. And Marty Scorsese was walking around all the time with a book called The Last Temptation of Christ. And because

we all kind of bonded together on New York, New York, De Niro said to me, look, I got this book. Why don't you produce it and we'll make this movie. And that took years though, right after.

Oh, it took many years. But like the New York, New York thing, like, you know, Bob went out and he learned how to play saxophone. You did everything you could. The like, you know, Bob went out and he learned how to play saxophone. You did everything you could.

The music, you know, and you got the edge to it. And how did it do at the box office? Not well. Not well. Why do you think? Huh?

Why do you think? It was very tough. It was very tough. Except, you know, we got a pretty good song out of it, you know. That's where the song came from.

Oh, yeah. That Frank took. What happened was, in the script, during their courtship and while they're in love and everything is going well, he says, I'm going to write a song for you in a major chord, a big, big song in a major chord. And that was kind of the theme of the movie to some extent.

And then Liza, because she had such big success with Kandir and Eb, the songwriter and composer of Cabaret, she said, why don't you hire Kandir and Eb to write the song? So we hired Kandir and Eb, and they wrote four songs. And we all went to New York, and they played the song for us. And the New York, New York song was kind of a little ditty. And we all said, wait a minute, you know, this has got to be a big dramatic song. And they said, well, we don't want to write a big dramatic song because we don't want to compete with the Camden and Green Leonard Bernstein song, New York, New York, it's a wonderful town. Right.

So we said, wait a minute, we don't care about that song. I mean, we want you to write a big, big dramatic song. And if you can't write it, we'll get somebody else to write it. They said, okay, let us try again. And two weeks later, I'll never forget it. I got a tape, an audio tape, and my wife and I were going to dinner at the Palm. And I put it in the audio player in my car, and it was Kander and Ebb at the piano singing New York, New York. And I put it in the audio player in my car and it was Kander and Ebb at the piano singing New York,

New York. And that's how we knew we had something. Yeah, and then Frank took it later and made it his, saved his career.

We couldn't get anybody to play Liza's version and it was really, really great. It just, radio didn't want to play it.

Sinatra was not doing particularly well in the late 70s or 76. And he called Liza and said, you know, I'd like to. She didn't own the song. We did. Yeah. But as a courtesy, he wanted to cover her song.

So he called her and said, do you mind if I record you a song? New York, New York. And she said, yeah. It's not going anywhere. And he did it. And it became a great, great thing for Sinatra's career at the time, and it became the theme song of New York now.

What it means to be, make it there, you can make it anywhere. And you own that song. Yeah. Nice job. Yeah, yeah. But again, it was only because we insisted that they write something that was great to matter. And you could never have known that it would have a life like that.

Never know. Never know. Because if we're concerned, after two years and you can't get it played, it's over. And also, the movie did okay. It was a great experience. But whatever you lost on the movie, you got back on the song. Yeah. And also, from that movie, I ended up making Raging Bull.

Yeah. And Last Temptation of Christ. you got back on the song yeah and also from that movie i ended up making raging bull yeah and last temptation well i ended up going through the process of lesson at the last minute we were so so over budget and so in difficulty on the right stuff that i had to devote more time to it bob and i had to really spend a lot of time on the right stuff which turned out i think one of the best movies i've ever been involved it's one of my favorite movies. And so I didn't do, I asked Marty to let me, I turned it over to him and never got credit on it. I think the amazing thing about The Right Stuff,

and I don't want to jump over Raging Bull, but I think the comedy of The Right Stuff is genius. It just rides the sign. But it's there. I mean, it's really a funny movie in some ways not like a slapstick comedy but there are moments just out of the the sort of uh the the insanity of trying to get these guys into space that are hilarious you had harry shearer jeff goldblum running down the hall yeah they got sputnik you know it was definitely linden

johnson character yeah great yeah Wanting to be on television. Oh, yeah, yeah. Oh, because of John Glenn's wife. That's right. You can't deal with that. But Raging Bull, I mean, so again, this is something that was a property that Bob was interested in, that someone else owned, that you got. Right. And you wrestled this thing into existence, really. Well, yeah, we did because Bob's passion for it and ultimately Marty's passion for it really was incredible. Rocky, which was an Academy Award winner and did great, great business, that we were able

to force the studio into making Raging Bull because they wanted us to make a Rocky II. But it turns out it's a truly different movie. Very different. And I like the whole process of trying to figure out how to make that character sympathetic. And dealing with Paul Schrader, and I don't remember who, what was the final script? Whose script was it, finally?

Well, finally the script was written by Marty Scorsese and Bob De Niro. What happened was, Paul did a really, really good job as far as structure is concerned. He's a dark cat, though. Yeah, he is dark. And we wanted more passion passion in a way right so

marty and uh and bob we kind of sent him down to uh get away from it all they went down to the caribbean to uh uh i forgot the name of the island and uh they spent three or four saint martin's saint martin's yes hey so what i found fascinating about that whole story outside of the you know the process and the editing and you know how it was it was shot and him learning how to fight and putting on the weight, all the stuff that we already know, that there was one moment in the story that really was revealing about Schrader and also revealing about what you're talking about now and finding the passion. When he's locked up in that jail cell and Schrader had scripted him jerking off. And that wasn't the way to go for the character. When he's locked up in that jail cell and Schrader had scripted him jerking off. Right. And that wasn't the way to go for the character. And somehow, not that it was offensive.

You know, guys jerk off, whatever. But that character was not that guy. Exactly. And it really says something about Schrader's inner life, not in a negative way, that he would have taken it in on himself. But then the choice to have him punching the wall. I'm not an animal. That was was between marty and bob yeah it's it's very it was you know there was a there there was something about that it's a very odd you know kind of like predicament like you know this guy's not gonna jerk off in this cell he's gonna beat the walls up yeah i just thought that was kind of a fascinating being up himself beating up himself. But then, of course, the job also, and I mention in the book,

then the process of making a film is there's a complication to that. Then the prop man and the set dresser come to me and say, what should we do with the wall? How do we build the wall? Because we don't want Bob De Niro to break his hand. Because he would. Yeah, because he'd punch the wall. So we have to make the wall look like it's real enough and still not give him not break his hand so you have to build in

so so all that kind of process comes into you know in a way to build it up and the type of producer you are you're involved with all the nuts and bolts of it yeah and and obviously it's it's one of the greatest movies ever and and again you, not realizing it because it's been a while and I didn't know the context of the industry then. That to have a guy that violent towards his wife, in the language, and then towards his brother. Even today, if you look at it, you're a bit surprised by it. And you got away with that. How? Well, what happened is, again, we had a lot of credibility because we had won an Academy Award for Rocky.

And what happened is Rocky was in a way the opposite of it because it was a film that was really, really, I think of as a great romance and a great story about believing in yourself and never backing, you know, if you have your chance, take it and run with it. Raging Bull's the opposite. Well, in a lot of ways, yes. Yes. It's what violence can do to you in a way, you know? Yeah, and pride and ego and all of this. Yeah, and it did well, obviously, Raging Bull.

It's still doing well. It still gets played all the time, and it's considered really, really one of the classic films of that period. And the story of The Right Stuff, which I thought, I love Philip Kaufman and I love the movie. But it wasn't, the story of the disappointment is kind of baffling. In retrospect, like, you know, this is a great movie. You know, and again, you wrangled it yourself with Tom Wolfe, right? Right. Tom was an old friend, and he gave us an early look at the book.

Yeah. And so you got the property. Yes, we bought the property cold. Yeah, and then— Out of our own money, by the way. And eventually you pulled in Philip to write it and he wanted to direct it. Well, what happened is originally we hired

another writer to do it and we weren't happy with the screenplay. Yeah. And then we gave it to Phil and we asked him to write it and then he didn't want to direct it so we had to convince him to direct it. Yeah. And what you get is this, like, it's sort of a masterpiece. By the way, the original writer was William Goldman, who was also a great writer.

Just passed away. Yeah, who wrote all the President's Men. But it turned out we didn't like the script. Yeah. Which was, everybody was kind of stunned by it. Right, and he took his money and he didn't want to do the second and third pass. And that's when we brought in Kaufman, yeah. Now, like, when you look at that, you know, the arc of that film and the making of it,

it was like kind of a spectacular event. You know, you got NASA on board. And it just does nothing. I mean, how do you explain that? Like, you go to the theater the day of, you think it's going to be a big hit, and there's nothing. Nobody there. I tell the story because I got up that morning, a Friday. We had got great reviews.

We had like 10 pages in Newsweek magazine, 10 pages in Time magazine. It was really, really great previews and everything else. And I got up that morning and I drove to Hollywood to see it was playing at the Chinese Theater. And there was nobody outside. And I thought, oh, boy. There was such a crowd that the theater manager let everybody in early

because they were rioting to get in. Of course, when I looked in, there was nobody there. Yeah. So I said, well,

I knew right then I was in trouble but I then, I drove to Century City where I was also playing. I said, well, maybe everybody

went to Century City. Turned out, there was nobody there either. Oh my God. And that night at home, I'm in really, really a depression. My son Adam came to me. He was going to Beverly Hills High. And he said, Dad, he said, you know, the strangest thing happened.

My teacher arranged for everybody to go see your movie, The Right Stuff, at the theater in Century City tomorrow. All they had to do was sign up, and they didn't have to go to class. They didn't go to the movie. I said, well, that's great. That's wonderful that your teacher did that. He said, yeah, but nobody signed up. Oh, my God. So I said to him, I said, wait a minute.

They'd rather sit in class than go to see my movie. That's not good. What do you think? Why do you think that happened? You know what? You never know. There is absolutely no reason for it no reason i thought about it for 30 40 years yeah and i really have never figured it out because it's a really really

a score that's absolutely great by bill conden or bill conti that won an academy award it's about america it's about the best things in amer. It ends up with a heroic performance by Sam Shepard. Oh, yeah. And it's about America conquering space. Yeah. It's funny, as you said. Yeah. It's moving.

And we couldn't get anybody to see it. And it won four Academy Awards. It was nominated for eight Academy Awards. To this day, I'll never figure out why. That's wild, man. I also want to give a little love to True Confessions, which I also think should have been a bigger movie, and I think it's a genius movie.

I love that movie. Thank you, thank you. That was so great. It also struck me about how aware you were of these actors, of Bob's ability, of De Niro's ability, to sort of really take on things that are sort of diametrically opposed. Like he took the challenge

to go from Raging Bull to True Confessions, which is like the opposite type of character. Exactly, exactly. You're absolutely right. It's just the opposite character. But you knew he could do it. Yeah, because he could do anything. I mean, the other day I was just,

and I had nothing to do with it, I was watching like Analyze This, and he's hysterical. Great mean, the other day I was just, and I had nothing to do with it. I was watching, like, Analyze This, and he's hysterical. Great, hysterical. I love that thing. So there's nothing he can't do. Whether you see him in The Irishman, I think you're going to see a performance that you cannot believe is so strong. I got to meet him because I did a very, very small part in this new Joker movie that Todd Phillips directed. Uh-huh.

So I got to do a scene with him. It was like, you him. He wouldn't remember me or anything, but it was very exciting to meet the guy. He's a very sweet guy. Well, we made, I think like also, like Aiden, let's see, we made New York, New York, Gang That Couldn't Shoot,

Raging Bull, True Confessions, Guilty by Suspicion, Goodfellas, and The Irishman. Well, yeah, let's talk about that a little bit. I mean, Goodfellas. Goodfellas. Yeah. And The Irishman. Well, yeah, let's talk about that a little bit. You know, I mean, Goodfellas, obviously, is one of the best movies. And you're telling me that The Irishman is a better gangster movie. So that, you know, I'm in.

Yeah. Why didn't you do Casino? You weren't part of that? Well, what happened was, at that point, I was starting to direct. Well, that's what I want to talk about. Yeah. I moved to directing. At that point, I was starting to direct.

Well, that's what I want to talk about. I moved to directing. After years, you watched a business change. You go from the 70s into the blockbuster time. And now, what was it that made you want to direct? I found producing was becoming a bit easy. Oh, you want to challenge yourself. I wanted something more challenging. was becoming a bit easy.

Oh, you want to challenge yourself. I wanted something more challenging, and I had a script that I thought could have been better directed than it was. Which one? I don't want to really say about the director, but it was The Music Box. Okay. Which Jessica Lange was nominated for Academy Award,

which is a terrific movie. Maybe I was jealous or something. I don't know. And I decided, I think I'm going to do this myself. And I got very, very interested in the blacklist that was going on in Hollywood in the 50s. I didn't know anything about it at all. You must have known guys that were blacklisted.

Not really. It was like, it was an unknown part of Hollywood. And really nobody talked about it. And I didn't know anything about it. And I got interested in it, and I started doing research. What was that one great book about it? Was it Naming Names? Well, it's called Naming Names by Victor Navasky.

It's a great, great book. So I got interested in it. I said, you know what? I wrote the script myself, and I said, you know what? I don't want to turn this over to somebody. I want to do it myself. And I decided, you know what? I wrote the script myself. And I said, you know what? I don't want to turn this over to somebody. I want to do it myself. And I decided to direct it. And in the book, I used my diary as a kind of.

I thought that was great. Yeah, to see how it actually came about. And when you reread that diary, did you relive that process? Yeah, it was really, really. But it became sort of an obsessive project with you. You engaged, you know, an actual... But every movie

is an obsessive project or else you never get them made. But you're directing this one. You got more on the line. Yes. You know, this is... You're new with this, right? Yeah, oh, yeah.

But I, you know, I lived through so much of it for all that period of time because actually I had another one that I was going to do a couple of years before that called Desiree Rose, where I worked on the script for a long time and I was going to do it.

And then that got canceled three days before shooting. But I'm obsessive about everything, every movie, whether I direct it or not. But I thought it was interesting that you wanted to get this right because of what it implied about the country, about the business, and how it's a cautionary tale. Yeah, and it was frankly something that I had my name on as a director for the first time, so I really wanted to make it. I thought it was a great movie. Well, thank you. Yeah.

I'm very proud of it. And it's interesting to read the diary in the book just in terms of just in terms of, you know, who's going to star in this. You didn't think De Niro would do it. And you're getting all these other options. You're not sure about the options. Some people you wanted. They couldn't do it. Everyone turned you down.

And De Niro decides to do it. But what was it that you wanted to get perfect in that? Because there would seem to be a real struggle with the character. Yeah, well, because I felt very strongly that the Hollywood blacklist, they would call you in. The government would call you in and say, you know what? You were at a party at Mark Barron's house. Yeah. And there were three or four people there that were talking about communism.

And you would say, yeah, people were chatting about it. Well, what were their names? And you say, wait a minute. Why do you want to know their names? They were just talking about communism. They weren't communists or anything. They said, that's okay, but we want to talk to them and see what their real feelings are. And you say, wait a minute, if I give you their names, they're going to get blacklisted.

Yeah. And they come back and say, well, if you don't give us their name, it means you're not patriotic, so you must be a communist. So basically, there was no way out. Dalton Trumbo said, there are no villains and there are no heroes. There are only victims. Well, I think in that time, though, it was a political agenda by a lunatic, Joe McCarthy. Yeah, but he was backed by a government. Don't forget, the blacklist started by

the truman administration what happened is when and i go into a little political history when when china became a communist country uh the republicans blamed the truman administration for allowing it to happen as if they could have stopped it. Right. So the Truman administration reaction to the Republican criticism that they were soft on communism really was responsible for the Hollywood blacklist. Right. I think like now the political culture of divisiveness is like, what's more troubling to me is the, you know, the propaganda that's, you know, that and the misinformation that's defining the anger of a certain faction of the country. Yes, and I think the media is very much involved in it. And, you know, when you watch one form of, when you watch Fox News, you get a picture of America that isn't realistic.

at a really, really picture of America that isn't realistic. But in terms of people being accused of things, I think it's a little different, like specifically with the sexual harassment, because it's a different sort of context to that. Well, yeah, what happened is... There's definitely victims that don't have a voice here. Yeah, and the victims have not had a voice for the last, you know, forever. So, I think,

look, not everybody that went to the guillotine in the French Revolution was guilty. There's always been a couple of people that got their head cut off that weren't, you know, but that happens in any revolution. But I think we're going through

a really interesting time as far as the revolution is concerned. And it's a good thing. And it was a good thing. Yeah, for sure. And you did that film with Tom Berringer that was sort of kind of saw this coming in a way. Yes, it was. I was very proud of that film. It's not very well known.

It's called Betrayed with the director. I remember it's menacing. Very menacing because it takes a look at the really, really tough right wing militants in America. By the way, day before, I think it was yesterday or the day before yesterday, the FBI arrested a militant group down in Texas that were holding.

Yeah. They were arresting people. They were holding asylum seekers. Yes. Yeah. No, I mean, they were there back in 88 when you made that movie, and now they're shameless and they're a dominant political voice. Yes.

Not a great evolution. And we picture them as family, people who had great picnics and july 4th celebrations but underneath it it was really a lot of hate and let me ask you i know you've directed a few other movies but i want to talk about some of the more recent films before i lose you here the wolf of wall street i thought was tremendous yeah what a fun movie an energetic movie yeah marty really goes goes for it now well that's the question it's like you know, obviously Creed was a great, very satisfying film. But Silence is kind of a difficult movie. Yeah, it took us almost 20 years to make.

And this is a passion project of his. It's very interesting that, you know, when you can see his kind of like mania, you know, and, you know, his obsession with music and editing and filmmaking and improvisation, you know, against, youation against these movies like that, which is sort of a poetic movie. It takes a lot of space. I think it's one of his best movies ever, frankly, because it's very deep in his soul.

It's about what he believes in, and it's about his Catholicism and his really beliefs. And really where you're caught up in how far does your belief take you? Yeah. And are there limits to that belief? And I think that's what he was examining with that film. I want to watch it again, you know,

because you get a certain thing in your head when you think Martin Scorsese, you know, and it's a thoughtful movie and it takes time. Very much so. Now, in terms of the business because like i said you know in the book you kind of break it into five parts uh about the evolution of the business and what's happening in the business and also obviously without really saying it your ability to adapt now you know when i read about what it took to make some films and you negotiations with the actors, agents, executives, everybody, directors, that now the entire ability to make a movie is untethered from any of that. You can just make it on your phone if you really want to, and people have done it.

So what are your concerns about the business as it stands. Obviously, with The Irishman, you're working with Netflix and you've sort of framed it in the book as being like, this is a great opportunity for 125 million people to see a movie, but we lose that beautiful magic. We've got the Marvel movies in the theaters and everything else, but you're aware of that.

I mean, what are your concerns about the film business? Well, I think in the case of Irishman, and I can't say that about other Netflix films particularly, or specifically, but as far as Irishman and I can't say that about other Netflix films particularly but or specifically but as far as Irishman is concerned I think the opportunity to see it in theaters is going to be available to a great many people yeah for a number of weeks yeah or and then hopefully they're going to sit back on the big

screen in their house and not on their phone and watch this movie. But I think basically back to the time of home video, when the business, when I first came, was in the throes of television's grasp. Everybody predicted nobody would go to a movie. They would, why see a movie if you can see it on television at home? Then it was, why see a movie if you can have a DVD that you can put into your, or actually a videotape?

Why do that? And I keep thinking about the DNA of all of us, whether we're Californians or New Yorkers or Londoners or South Africans or some guy in Tokyo. People. People. In our DNA, there was some man or woman who scratched together a couple of stones and made a spark and made a fire. So these almost Neanderthal people, maybe a little more sophisticated, gathered around the fire, probably to keep warm at the time.

Yep. And somebody showed up and told the story. Yeah. And people sat around and came to listen to the story. And one guy said, we saw Zach last week. Terrific. Very good. But I think what's happened is people are still going to go to the theater.

Sure. They're still going to go to a movie theater. They're still going to want to gather around in some place. The communal desire is still there. I think it's in our DNA. I think that's part of who we are. Yeah. And I don't think that's going to diminish it. And do you, like, you know, like I sometimes am nostalgic for a smaller media landscape

because I think it helped community in the sense that even when it was television, when there were three channels, you know, everybody was sort of talking about the same thing. Now you talk about a show and people, you tell them where it's on, they don't know what that is. So is that sort of like mass democratization of the business? No, it's not even that. I think basically it's the social climate that we live in is very, very different. I was on a plane the other day and they had,

everybody was watching on television screen except half the crowd was watching the same movie on their iPhone. Yeah. When they had the biggest screen to watch right in front of them. Slightly bigger. Yeah. Yeah, somewhat bigger. Yeah.

But they still were watching on the iPhone. But do you think it diminishes the quality or that- Of course it diminishes the quality. Yeah, I mean- We make the film for the big screen no matter what. Yeah, right. Whether you make it for... No, I'm saying that do you think that because there's so much available

and there's such a hunger for content that it's going to be harder for the great things to come forward? No, great things will always come forward. Talent will always persist. Okay. great things will always come forth. Talent will always persist. I think if you said to me, what is the secret of your longevity of all these years and still making movies? I say it's my relationship to A, the book and B, the talent or that's one and the same.

That being the director, the actors. Then the script. Yeah. The writers. Everybody will be flocking towards a really, really good script. That includes the director, the actor, the studio, the financiers, the distributor, the theater, and the audience. Good scripts. Well, great, man. That was a great way to end. Thank you for talking to me, Erwin. Thank you.

It was great, great questions. Thank you. I appreciate it. Thank you for talking to me, Erwin. Thank you. It was great, great questions. I appreciate it. Yeah, I know I didn't get to everything, but what a great guy. What a great talk.

Some real good stories, man. Good stories. Erwin Winkler's book, A Life in Movies, Stories from 50 Years in Hollywood, comes out May 7th. You can preorder it now. Okay, now I'm'm gonna play some kind of bouncy echoey um you know it sounds a little senegalese to me right all right here we go here we go Thank you. Boomer lives! you can get anything you need with uber eats well almost almost anything so no you can't get an ice rink on uber eats but iced tea and ice cream yes we can deliver that uber eats get almost almost

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